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The Minister of Evil: The Secret History of Rasputin's Betrayal of Russia

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Title: The Minister of Evil: The Secret History of Rasputin's Betrayal of Russia

Author: William Le Queux


        
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                Most recently updated: January 3, 2021

Language: English

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The Minister of Evil

The Secret History of
RASPUTIN'S
Betrayal of Russia


William Le Queux


Cassell and Company, Ltd
London, New York, Toronto and Melbourne


First Published August 1918.
_Reprinted September 1918._


Copyright, 1917, by William Le Queux, in the United States of America.




TO THE READER


AFTER the issue to the public of the curious chronicle of "Rasputin the
Rascal Monk," based upon official documents, and its translation into a
number of languages, I received from the same sources in Russia a bulky
manuscript upon very thin paper which contained certain confessions,
revelations, and allegations made by its writer, Féodor Rajevski, who
acted as the mock-saint's secretary and body-servant, and who, in
consequence, was for some years in a position to know the most inner
secrets of Rasputin's dealings with those scoundrelly men and women who
betrayed Holy Russia into the hands of the Hun.

This manuscript, to-day before me as I write, is mostly in Italian, for
Rajevski, the son of a Polish violinist, lived many years of his youth in
Bologna, Florence, and old-world Siena, hence, in writing his memoirs, he
used the language most familiar to him, and one perhaps more readily
translated by anyone living outside Russia.

In certain passages I have been compelled to disguise names of those who,
first becoming tools of the mock-saint, yet afterwards discovering him to
be a charlatan, arose in their patriotism and--like Rajevski who here
confesses--watched patiently, and as Revolutionists became instrumental
in the amazing charlatan's downfall and his ignominious death.

These startling revelations of the secretary to the head of the "dark
forces" in Russia, as they were known in the Duma, are certainly most
amazing and unusually startling, forming as they do a disgraceful secret
page of history that will prove of outstanding interest to those who come
after us.

I confess that when first I read through the bald statements of fact,
which I have here endeavoured to place in readable form for British
readers, I became absorbed--therefore I venture to believe that they will
be just as interesting to others who read them.

WILLIAM LE QUEUX.

DEVONSHIRE CLUB, LONDON,
_January, 1918_.




CONTENTS

CHAPTER                                    PAGE
 1. RASPUTIN MEETS THE EMPRESS                1
 2. RASPUTIN ENTERS TSARSKOE-SELO            19
 3. THE POTSDAM PLOT DEVELOPS                36
 4. THE MURDER OF STOLYPIN                   53
 5. THE POWER BEHIND THE THRONE              68
 6. RASPUTIN IN BERLIN                       85
 7. SCANDAL AND BLACKMAIL                   100
 8. RASPUTIN THE ACTUAL TSAR                116
 9. THE TRAGEDY OF MADAME SVETCHINE         132
10. TRAITOROUS WORK                         148
11. POISON PLOTS THAT FAILED                163
12. RASPUTIN AND THE KAISER                 180
13. THE "PERFUME OF DEATH"                  197
14. MILIUKOFF'S EXPOSURE                    214
15. THE TRAITORS DENOUNCED                  229




CHAPTER I

RASPUTIN MEETS THE EMPRESS


THE Spanish author Yriarte wrote those very true words:

    "_Y ahora digo yo; llene un volumen_
     _De disparates un Autor famoso,_
     _Y si no alabaren, que me emplumen._"

For those who do not read Spanish I would translate the passage as:

     "Now I say to you; let an author of renown fill a book with
     twaddle, and if it is not praised by the critics, you may tar and
     feather me."

I am not an author of renown. Indeed, I make no pretence of the
delicacies of literary style, or the turning of fine phrases of elegant
diplomacy. My object is merely to record in these pages the truth
regarding the crumbling of Russia, and the downfall of our Imperial
Throne.

Anyone who cares to search the voluminous records in the Bureau of Police
in the long Bibikovsky Boulevard, in Kiev, will find my _dossier_ neatly
filed and tabulated, as are those of most Russians. You will find that I,
Féodor, son of Féodor Rajevski, musician temporarily abroad, and his wife
Varvara, was born in the Via Galliera, at Bologna, in Italy, on July 8,
1880, and on March 3, 1897, entered the University in the Vladimirskaya.
I venture to think that the police have but little inscribed to my
detriment save perhaps a few students' pranks in the Kreshtchatik, and
the record of that memorable night when we daubed with blue and white
paint the equestrian statue in front of the Merchants' Club, and I was
fined twenty roubles by the bearded old magistrate for the part I played
in the joke.

Had there been anything serious against me I doubt whether I should have
occupied, as I did for some years, the post of confidential secretary to
"Grichka," that saintly unwashed charlatan whose real name was Gregory
Novikh, and whom the world knew by the nickname of "Rasputin."

Of my youth I need say but little. After my student days I obtained,
through the influence of a high Government official named Branicki, a
friend of my father, a clerical post in the bureau of political police of
the Empire, a department of the Ministry of the Interior, and for several
years pursued a calm, uneventful life in that capacity. In consequence of
a grave scandal discovered in my department--for my chief had secured the
conviction of a certain wealthy nobleman named Tiniacheff, in Kharkoff,
who was perfectly innocent of any offence--I was one day called as
witness by the court of inquiry sitting in Moscow.

It was at that inquiry early in 1903 that I first met General
Kouropatkine, who at that time had risen to high favour with Her Majesty
the Empress and was--as was afterwards discovered--urging the Tsar to
make war against Japan, well knowing that any attacks by us would be
foredoomed to failure. At the General's instigation I was transferred to
the Ministry of War as an under-secretary in his Cabinet, and he sent
me--on account of my knowledge of Italian--upon a confidential mission to
Milan. This, I presume, I carried out entirely to his satisfaction, for
on two other occasions I was sent to Italy with messages to a certain
Baron Svereff, a rich Russian financier living in San Remo, and with whom
no doubt Kouropatkine was engaged in traitorous dealings.

One day, having been called by telephone to the house of His Excellency,
I found, seated in his big luxuriously furnished room, and chatting
confidentially, a strange-looking, unkempt, sallow-faced man of thirty or
so, with broad brow, narrow sunken cheeks, and long untrimmed beard, who,
as soon as he turned his big deep-set eyes upon mine, held me in
fascination.

His was a most striking countenance, broad in the protruding forehead
which narrowed to the point of his black beard, and being dressed as a
monk in a long, shabby, black robe I recognised at once he was one of
those fakirs we have all over Russia, one of those self-sacrificing bogus
"holy" men who wander from town to town obsessed by religious mania, full
of fictitious self-denial, yet collecting kopecks for charity.

Religion of all creeds has its esoteric phases, and our own Greek Church
is certainly not alone in its "cranks."

"Rajevski, this is the Starets, Gregory Novikh," said the General, who
was in uniform with the cross of St. Andrew at his throat.

I stood for a few seconds astounded. On being introduced to me, the
unkempt, uncleanly fellow crossed his arms over his chest, bowed, and
growled in a deep voice a word of benediction.

I expressed pleasure at meeting him, for all Russia was at the moment
ringing with the renown of the modest Siberian "saint" who could work
miracles. For the past month or so the name of "Grichka" had been upon
everyone's lips. The ignorant millions from the Volga to Vladivostok had
been told that a new saint had arisen in Russia; one possessed of Divine
influence; a man who lived such a clean and blameless life in imitation
of Christ that he was destined as the spiritual Guide and Protector of
Russia, and to eclipse even Saint Nicholas himself.

As one level-headed and educated I had always had my doubts concerning
all "holy" wanderers who meander across the steppes collecting alms.
Knowing much of the evil life lived in our Russian monasteries and
convents, and the warm welcome given to every charlatan who grows his
beard, forgets to wash, lifts his eyes heavenwards, and begs, I had, I
confess at the outset, but little faith in this new star in Holy Russia's
firmament now introduced to me by His Excellency the Minister of War.

"I have been speaking with the Starets concerning you," the Minister
said, as he turned in his padded chair, and flicked the ash from his
exquisite Bogdanoff cigarette. "I have detached you from my department to
become secretary to the Starets. Yours will be an enviable post, my dear
Féodor, I assure you. Russia is in her degeneration. The Starets has been
sent to us by Divine Providence to regenerate and reform her."

"But, your Excellency, I am very content in my present post--I----"

"I issued the decree from the Ministry this morning," he interrupted in
his fierce, blustering manner, that manner which, years later, carried
him through the war with Japan. "It is all arranged. You are the
secretary of our protector whom Almighty God has sent to Russia for our
salvation."

My eyes met the piercing gaze of the unkempt scoundrel, and, to my
surprise, I found myself held mystified. Never before had any man or
woman exercised such an all-powerful influence over me by merely gazing
at me. That it was hypnotic was without doubt. The fellow himself with
his sallow cheeks, his black beard, his deep-set eyes, and his broad brow
was the very counterpart of those portraits which the old cinquecento
artists of Italy painted of criminal aristocrats.

In the Pitti and the Uffizi in Florence, in the great gallery in Siena;
in Venice, Rome, and Milan hung dozens of portraits resembling closely
that of Gregory Novikh, the man who, to my own knowledge as I intend to
here show, betrayed Russia, and destroyed the Imperial House of Romanoff.

In that look I had foreseen in him something terrible; I had read the
whole of his destiny in his glance. His gaze for the moment overwhelmed
me. Once or twice in my life--as it comes to most men--I have met with
that expression in the countenances of those I have come across: it
presaged crime, and the prophecy, alas! has been verified. Crime was in
Gregory Novikh.

Perhaps Rasputin--as the world called him and as I will call him--knew
that crime was in him. I think he did. By his eyes I knew him to be a
criminal sensualist with murder in his heart.

I had heard a whisper of his sordid and miserable elemental passions,
even though the Starets was, next to His Majesty the Tsar, the most
popular man in all the Empire.

To be appointed his confidential secretary was surely great advancement
at a single bound, for though sensuality was to him as natural as the air
he breathed, yet he had the highest society of Petrograd already at his
feet.

Compelled to accept my unwanted appointment, I bowed, and expressed
gratification that I should have been chosen for such a post.

"You must be discreet, my dear Féodor," said His Excellency, throwing his
cigarette end into the great bronze bowl at his elbow. "When I have sent
you upon confidential missions you have been as dumb as an oyster. This
new post I give to you because I know that you are a true patriotic
Russian, and if you see and know certain things you will never chatter
about them to the detriment of myself, or of our very good friend
Grichka. To him, remember, everything is permitted. You will learn much,
but rather than speak let your tongue be cut out. And that," he added,
looking at me very seriously as he lowered his voice, "and that, I warn
you, will be the judgment upon you in the fortress of Schlüsselburg if
you dare to divulge a single secret of Russia's saviour!"

I stood aghast between this all-powerful War Minister in his glittering
decorations, the Emperor's right hand and confidant, and the unkempt,
ragged, wandering collector of kopecks--the man whose eyes held me in
their fascination each time they met my gaze.

The suddenness of it all bewildered me. The salary I was to receive, as
mentioned by His Excellency, was most generous, indeed, more than double
that which I had been paid by the Ministry of War. It meant luxury beyond
my wildest dreams; a life of ease, affluence, and influence.

Is it any wonder therefore that I accepted it, little knowing in those
days of peace that I was a pawn in the great game of the Hun?

How shall I describe Rasputin? My pen fails me. He was one of a few great
charlatans of saintly presence and of specious words, fascinators of
women, and domineerers of men, who have been sent to the world at
intervals through all the ages. Had he lived in the twelfth or thirteenth
century of our era he would no doubt have been canonised. This rough,
uncouth, illiterate Siberian peasant, who had been convicted of
horse-stealing, and of immorality, who had served years of imprisonment
in the gaol at Tobolsk, and who had only a month before we met been flung
out of a monastery in Odessa and kicked half to death by its inmates as a
fraud, had actually become the most popular person in Petrograd.

With the women of the aristocracy he was well-known, but to the Imperial
Court he had not risen. Yet, being a _protégé_ of Kouropatkine, matters
were no doubt being arranged, although I was, of course, in ignorance of
the traitorous plans in progress.

On the following morning, according to my instructions given me by my new
chief, I called upon him at the small ground-floor flat which he occupied
in the Poltavskaya, close to the Nicholas Station. The house, the
remaining rooms of which were unoccupied, was a dark forbidding-looking
one, with a heavy door beneath a portico, and containing deep cellars
into which nobody ever penetrated save the Starets himself.

On the morning of my first visit there, I was, from the beginning, much
mystified. The dining-room was quite a luxurious apartment, so was the
"saint's" study--a den with a soft Eastern carpet, a big writing-table, a
high porcelain stove of chocolate and white, and silk-upholstered
settees. From this den a door opened into the "holy" man's
sleeping-room, an apartment of spartan plainness save for its big stove,
a replica of the one in the study.

The household, I found, consisted of one other person, an old Siberian
peasant woman of about sixty, named Anna, who came from Pokrovsky, the
"saint's" native village. She acted as housekeeper and maid-of-all-work.

That first morning spent with Rasputin was full of interest. He was a
dirty, uncouth, illiterate fellow who repelled me. His hands were hard,
his fingers knotty, his face was of a distinctly criminal type, and yet
in my bewilderment I remembered that General Kouropatkine had declared
him to be sent by the Almighty as the Protector of Russia.

His conversation was coarse and overbearing, and interlarded by
quotations from Holy Writ. He mentioned to me certain ladies in high
society, and related, with a broad grin upon his saintly countenance,
scandal after scandal till I stood aghast.

Truly the "saint" was a most remarkable personality. From the first I had
been compelled to admit that whatever the Russian public had said, there
was a certain amount of basis for the gossip. His was the most weird and
compelling personality that I had ever met. Even Stolypin had been
impressed by him, though the Holy Synod had declared him to be a fraud.

My work consisted of reading to him and replying to letters from hundreds
of women who had become attracted by his peculiar distorted emotional
religion, many of whom desired to enter the cult which he had
established. As secretary it was also my duty to arrange for the weekly
reunions of the "sister-disciples," held in a big bare upstairs room, in
which hung a holy ikon and several sacred pictures, and in which the
mysteries of his "religion" were practised.

Ere long, I found that to those weekly séances there flocked many of the
wealthiest and most cultured women in Petrograd, who actually held the
ex-horse-stealer in veneration, and believed, as the peasants believed,
that he could work miracles.

One afternoon, after I had been nearly a month in Rasputin's service,
Boris Stürmer, a well-known Court sycophant, with bristling hair and a
sweeping goatee beard, was brought to the monk by Kouropatkine. Both were
in uniform, and after ushering them into Rasputin's study I felt that
some dark conspiracy was on foot.

They remained in council for nearly an hour when I was called into the
room, and to me, as the monk's right hand, the plot was explained so that
I could assist in it.

To me the German Stürmer, who afterwards rose to be Prime Minister of
Russia, was no stranger. Indeed, it was he who, inviting me to be seated,
explained what was in progress.

"It is necessary, Rajevski, that the Father should meet Her Majesty the
Empress. He is our saviour, and it is but right that he should come to
the Imperial Court. But he cannot be introduced by any of the ordinary
channels. Her Majesty must be impressed, and her curiosity aroused."

I bowed in assent, little dreaming of the devilish scheme which,
instigated from Potsdam, and paid for by German gold, was about to be
worked. Already Germany had decided to conquer Russia, and already the
far-seeing Kaiser had watched and recognised that he could use Rasputin's
undoubted influence in our priest-ridden country for his own dastardly
ends.

"Now," continued Stürmer, stroking his beard as he looked at me. "We have
just discovered that Her Majesty intends to pay a visit incognita next
Friday to the shrine of Our Lady at Kazan, in order to pray for the birth
of an heir to the Romanoffs. We have therefore decided that our Father
shall go to Kazan, and be found by the Empress praying before the shrine
beseeching the Almighty to grant Her Majesty her fond desire. He will
appear to her a perfect stranger uttering exactly the same prayer as that
in her mind."

"They will not speak," Kouropatkine added. "Our Father will apparently
take no notice of her save to glance into her face, for why should he
recognise in her the Empress?"

I saw with what ingenuity the plan was being laid, for well I knew the
amazing and quite uncanny fascination for women of all classes possessed
by the Starets.

At the time I naturally believed that Stürmer and his friend Kouropatkine
were both convinced that it would be to the advantage of Russia if the
holy man gained admission to the Imperial Court as spiritual guide to
Nicholas II. Such a widely popular figure had the Starets become, and so
deeply impressed had been the people of Moscow and Warsaw, where he had
performed some mysterious "miracles," that there were hundreds of
thousands of all classes who, like the two Ministers of the Crown who sat
in that room, really believed that he was possessed of Divine power.

As we walked in the Nevski, people, mostly women, would rush to him and
kiss his dirty hand, or raise the hem of his greasy kaftan to their lips,
asking for the Father's blessing. By the enlightened Western peoples the
ignorance and superstitions of our great Russian people cannot be
understood. You, who have travelled in our Holy Russia, know our
trackless country where settlements are to distances, as one of our
writers has put it, as fly-specks upon window-panes, where whole villages
are the prey of disease, and where seventy-nine people out of every
hundred cannot read or write. You also know how in the corner of every
room hangs the ikon, how the gold or blue-domed basilica strikes you in
every street, the long-haired priests chanting in their deep bass, the
passer-by ceaselessly crossing himself, the peasantry crushed and
down-trodden, and the middle and upper classes lapped in luxury and
esteeming good manners more highly than morals. Such is Russia of
to-day--Russia in the age of my employer Rasputin, the era of the
downfall of the Imperial Romanoffs, and the fierce struggle with the
barbaric Hun.

In accordance with the plan formed by Boris Stürmer I next day
accompanied the Starets by rail direct to Nijni Novgorod, by way of
Moscow, thence taking steamer down the great Volga, a twelve-hour
journey, to that city where they make bells and ikons, Kazan.

Rasputin had put on his oldest and most ragged monk's habit, and carried
a staff. Over his threadbare dress he wore another of finer texture which
it was his intention to discard ere entering before the shrine, in order
to appear most lowly and humble in the eyes of the shrewd Tsaritza. We
left Petrograd at night, that our departure should not be known and
commented upon, but ere we did so I received a note from the General to
the effect that the director of Secret Police at Tsarskoe-Selo had
telephoned that Her Majesty was not leaving till the following day.

Hence we were travelling a day ahead of the Empress.

Kazan is a city full of the odour of sanctity if judged by the number of
priests and monks one meets in its streets. It is situated about seven
versts from the river, an old-world picturesque place wherein one rubs
shoulders with people in all sorts of curious costumes, especially in the
Tartar suburb where the low houses border upon narrow unpaved streets
dotted here and there with mosques.

On arrival we drove up the hill to the great Preobrazhensky Monastery
where Rasputin, as became a holy man, sought hospitality and was
immediately very warmly welcomed, while I afterwards went on to the Hotel
Frantsiya, in the long busy Vozkrensenkaya, where I took a room in order
to watch the arrival of Alexandra Feodorovna, who would travel incognita,
and of whose coming I was to give warning to Grichka.

For two days I waited, ever on the alert, and, of course, interested in
the adventure. It is not always that one waits in an hotel in expectation
of the arrival of an empress. Meanwhile I had made friends with the hotel
clerk, without, of course, explaining my business, and he had promised to
tell me of all new arrivals.

The Frantsiya is a very comfortable hotel, conducted upon French lines,
and the two days I spent in Kazan were certainly quite enjoyable ones.

On the evening of the third day my friend the hotel clerk sent a message
to my room, and in response I at once descended to the bureau, when he
informed me that the ladies had just arrived, a Madame Strepoff, and her
maid Mademoiselle Kamensky. He described the first-named, and I at once
recognised her as the Tsaritza herself, though, of course, the tall, pale
young man had no idea of her identity. I had merely told him that I
expected the arrival of a lady whom I had met in Moscow some time ago.

"Madame has taken the best suite of rooms in the hotel," the clerk said.
"She is evidently an aristocrat though she is only Madame Strepoff. I
have just sent their passports to the police."

The hour was immediately before dinner, therefore I lounged about the
entrance hall awaiting the appearance of the two travellers who, the
clerk had told me, had not ordered dinner in their rooms, so evidently
they intended to dine in the public restaurant.

Just after half-past seven they descended the broad staircase. There was
but little difference in their ages. In an instant I recognised the
handsome Empress by the many photographs I had seen. The other, dark and
also good-looking, was evidently a lady-in-waiting, a lady whom I
afterwards met at Court.

The pair, dressed inconspicuously in black, seated themselves at a little
_table à deux_ in the window, while I followed, and having selected a
table opposite, ate my meal as I watched.

The Empress in incognita seemed in high spirits, perhaps because she had
escaped from the Imperial Court. She chatted confidentially with her
companion, and more than once cast an inquiring glance in my direction,
as though wondering whether I were not an agent of the Okhrana, the
ubiquitous secret police of the Empire. It is only too true that wherever
one goes in Russia one is "shadowed" by the police, and Her Majesty knew
full well that the bureau of "personal police" at Tsarskoe-Selo would
know that she had left the palace and would keep an eye upon her, because
just about that period the air was full of plots against the dynasty.

The Empress and her bosom friend Mademoiselle Zéneide Kamensky--whom I
afterwards knew her to be--finished their meal unrecognised by the
servants, or any of those in the restaurant, and then returned to their
rooms. Afterwards I took a droshky up to the Preobrazhensky Monastery,
which I reached about ten o'clock. The old monk who answered my ring at
the barred door returned with a message from Rasputin to the effect that
I was to tell him the object of my visit. This I refused to do, and
became insistent upon seeing him. Such hesitation on Rasputin's part
greatly surprised me. Indeed, it was not before nearly half an hour had
elapsed that the long-bearded old janitor unwillingly conducted me
through the long, bare corridors of the monastery where my footsteps on
the flags awakened the echoes, and after several turns ushered me into a
small, well-furnished room, wherein, in an armchair before the stove, sat
the charlatan who was posing as the Saviour of Russia.

In an instant I realised that he was in an advanced state of
intoxication. As I entered he rose unsteadily, and addressing me declared
that life in the Spasso-Preobrazhensky was most pleasant, and at once
began singing a ribald song.

I stood aghast. This was the man who, by the scheming of Stürmer and his
catspaw, was to be introduced to the Imperial Court! So fuddled was he by
vodka that he was unable to understand the purport of my visit. He merely
laughed inanely and began to repeat parrot-like those curious prayers
which he recited at the weekly reunions of the sister-disciples--passages
culled haphazard from Holy Writ, interspersed with the most obscene and
ribald allegations, a jumble of piety and blasphemy that none could ever
understand.

Soon I realised the hopelessness of the situation. This was the first I
knew that the "saint" was addicted to alcohol, although he drank wine
freely at meals and always kept champagne for his friends, paid for out
of his collections for charity. In his inebriated state his wild-looking
eyes glowed like coals, and as he looked at me I experienced once more
the strange sensation of being enthralled. Truly, there was something
mesmeric about that gaze of his, a mystery that I have never solved.

A priest entered after I had been there a few minutes, and to him I
remarked that the Father being "rather unwell" I would return early next
day. He smiled meaningly, and I departed.

Having no knowledge of what hour the Empress intended to visit the shrine
of Our Lady, I was back again at the monastery at dawn when I found the
Starets had quite recovered. As soon as I told him of the presence of the
Tsaritza he bustled about, and in his oldest robe, rusty, travel-worn and
frayed, he accompanied me to the fine church of Bogoroditsky.

It was then only seven o'clock, and we found the church with its many
candles and its much venerated shrine quite deserted save for one or two
peasant women who had halted to pray on their way to work.

Outside we stood together gazing down the long white road which led from
the direction of the Hotel Frantsiya.

"Alexandra Feodorovna must certainly come this way," remarked the ragged
"saint" as I stood at his side. "Remain here and keep watch. I shall go
to yonder house and speak with the people. When the carriage approaches,
let me know quickly."

Then leaving me the Starets crossed to a small house which he entered to
give its inmates his blessing--blessing forsooth from such an unholy,
unwashed scoundrel!

Through an hour I waited in patience, until in the distance I saw a
carriage approaching, and at once gave warning, whereupon the Father
entered the church and threw himself upon his knees devoutly before the
holy shrine and began to pray earnestly aloud in his deep bass.

I had entered after him, and secreting myself behind one of the massive
pillars watched the arrival of the two females in dead black, who,
crossing themselves as they entered, approached the shrine.

As they did so Rasputin, apparently unconscious of their presence, cried
in a loud voice:

"O God! in Thy gracious bounty give unto our Imperial House of Romanoff a
son--one who shall in due time wear the glorious crown of the Tsars and
become the Sovereign Defender of All the Russias against our enemies. In
this my prayer I most humbly echo the voice of Russia's millions, whose
dearest wish is that a son be born unto our Imperial House. O God, I
beseech thee to grant us our request!"

From my place of concealment I saw the Tsaritza start visibly. She wore a
veil, so that I could not see her countenance. She had halted, entranced
by overhearing that prayer uttered by the unkempt stranger. I noticed
that she whispered a word to her companion, who, like herself, was
veiled, and then Her Majesty threw herself upon her knees, an example
followed by Mademoiselle Kamensky.

The Empress, her head bowed in silence, knelt before the weird impressive
shrine, side by side with the Starets. The great church was dark save for
the light of the myriad candles, and silent save for the twittering of a
bird, yet I could see that the pious exhortation of Rasputin had been
taken as an omen by Her Majesty.

Suddenly, the mock saint's voice again rang out clearly in the great
cavernous basilica as he repeated the prayer in clear impassioned
words--that same prayer which the Empress was repeating in silence.

Only the three knelt there. For a full ten minutes silence again reigned.
Neither of the kneeling figures stirred until Rasputin crossed himself
slowly, and for a third time, raising his voice still higher he besought
the Almighty to grant Russia an heir to the Throne.

Then, at last, he rose with slow dignity as became a saintly priest, and
again he made the sign of the cross.

As he did so the Empress who had raised her veil turned her head,
whereupon he halted for several seconds and gazed straight into her face
with that intense, hypnotic stare which always held women in such
mysterious fascination. I saw that the Empress was again startled, but
folding his hands across his breast, an attitude habitual to him, the
Starets passed out of the church without a second glance at her, leaving
her breathless and trembling.

When he had gone she turned in alarm and whispered with her
lady-in-waiting. Both women rose, and, following the monk, stood gazing
at his receding figure as he went down the long white road.

"A strange man surely, Zéneide!" I heard the Empress exclaim. "How
curious that, unconscious of my presence, he should be here, praying for
me--a holy man without a doubt! We must discover who he is. What eyes!
Did you notice them?"

"Yes. His gaze really frightened me," her companion admitted.

"Ah! His is the face of a true saint--a wonder-worker! Of that I am
certain. We must make inquiries concerning him," remarked Her Majesty. "I
must see him again and speak with him!"

Then the pair, entering the carriage, drove rapidly away.

While standing upon the church steps they had discussed the Starets while
I had lounged close by unnoticed, believing that we were alone.

As the carriage moved off, however, I was startled to feel strong hands
laid heavily upon me, as a rough voice exclaimed:

"Halt! You are under arrest!"

Next second I became aware that I was in the hands of two rather well
dressed men, no doubt agents of the Okhrana.

"You have been loitering here with evil intent!" exclaimed the elder of
the pair. "We have been watching you ever since you entered behind that
good Father. We saw you secrete yourself. Have you any firearms?"

I unfortunately had a revolver, and at once produced it.

"Ah!" exclaimed the brown-bearded agent of Secret Police as he took
possession of it. "I thought so! You had discovered the identity of the
lady with the long veil, and have been here awaiting an opportunity to
fire at her!"

"What?" I gasped, aghast at the serious charge levelled against me. "I am
no revolutionist! I carry that weapon merely for my self-protection."

The bearded man gave a low whistle, and next moment three grey-coated
policemen in uniform sprang up from nowhere, and I was unceremoniously
marched through the streets to the head police bureau in the Gostiny
Dvor, well knowing the seriousness of the allegation against me.

Two hours later I was taken to the dark-panelled room of the Chief of
Police, a bald-headed, flabby-faced functionary in a dark blue uniform
glittering with decorations. Before his big table, standing between two
policemen, I answered question after question he put to me, my replies
being carefully noted by a clerk who sat at a side table. In the room
were also the two officers of the Okhrana who had travelled, unknown to
the Empress, in order to keep Her Majesty beneath their surveillance.

"Why did you arrive at the Frantsiya and await the coming of the two
ladies?" snapped the Chief of Police in his peculiarly offensive manner.

I was at loss what to say. I was unable to tell the truth lest I should
betray the plot of Boris Stürmer and General Kouropatkine. I recollected
my friendship with the hotel clerk, and my eagerness for the arrival of
the travellers.

"Ah! You hesitate!" said the all-powerful functionary with a sinister
grin, and knowing what I did of the political police and their arbitrary
measures towards those suspected, I realised that I was in very grave
danger.

"You had secret knowledge of Her Majesty's journey incognita, or you
would not have been watching in the church with a loaded revolver in your
pocket," he went on. "Your Brothers of Freedom, as you term them, never
lack knowledge of Their Majesties' movements," my inquisitor said.

"I deny, your Excellency, that I was there with any evil intent," I
protested. "Such a thing as you suggest never for a second entered my
mind."

The man in the brilliant uniform laughed, saying:

"I have heard that same declaration before. It is a clever plot, no
doubt, but fortunately you were watched, and the knowledge that you were
being watched prevented you from putting your plans into execution.
Come--confess!"

"I had no idea that I was being watched until I was arrested," I
declared.

"But you cannot explain the reason why you travelled from Petrograd to
Kazan. Let us hear your excuse," he said with increased sarcasm.

"I have no excuse," was my very lame reply. I was wondering what had
become of the Starets. It was quite evident that they knew nothing of my
double journey up to the monastery, and further, there was no suspicion
against Rasputin. That being so I hesitated to explain the truth, in the
faint hope that Kouropatkine, as Minister of War, would hear of my
arrest, and contrive to obtain my release. I saw that, at least, I ought
to remain loyal to those who employed me, and further, even if I told the
truth it would not be believed.

"It will be best to make some inquiries in Petrograd regarding this
individual," suggested the police agent who had arrested me.

"I really don't think that is necessary," replied the Chief of Police of
Kazan, tapping his desk impatiently with his pen, as he turned to me and
said:

"Now, tell me quickly, young man. Why are you here?"

What could I reply?

"Ah!" he said, smiling. "I see that there are others whom you refuse to
implicate. It is useless to send such people as you for trial."

"But I demand a fair trial!" I cried in desperation, a cold sweat
breaking out on my brow, because I knew that he had power to pass
sentence upon me as a political suspect who refused information--and that
his order would certainly be confirmed by the Minister of the Interior.

Too well did I know the drastic powers of the Chiefs of Police of the
principal cities.

At my demand the bald-headed man simply smiled, and replied:

"My order is that you be conveyed to Schlüsselburg. You will there have
plenty of leisure in which to repent not having replied to my questions."

To Schlüsselburg! My heart fell within me. Once within that dreaded
fortress, the terrible oubliettes of which are below the surface of the
Lake Ladoga, my identity would be lost and I should be quickly forgotten.
From Schlüsselburg no prisoner ever returned!

Would any of the conspiring trio, whose tool I had been, raise a finger
to save me? Or would they consider that having served their purpose it
would be to their advantage if my lips were closed?

"Schlüsselburg!" I gasped. "No--no, not that!" I cried. "I am
innocent--quite innocent!"

"You give no proof of it," coldly replied the Chief of Police, rising as
a sign that the inquiry was at an end. "My orders are that you be sent to
Schlüsselburg without delay." Then, turning to the two agents of the
Okhrana, he added: "You will report this to your director at
Tsarskoe-Selo. I will send my order to the Ministry for confirmation
to-night. Take the prisoner away!"

And next moment I was bundled down to a dirty cell in the basement, there
to await conveyance to that most dreaded of all the prisons in the
Empire.

By a single stroke of the pen I had been condemned to imprisonment for
life!




CHAPTER II

RASPUTIN ENTERS TSARSKOE-SELO


I CONFESS that I felt my position to be absolutely hopeless.

I was a political suspect, and therefore I knew full well that to attempt
to communicate with anyone outside was quite impossible. The Chief of
Police of Kazan, honestly believing that he was doing his duty and
unearthing a subtle plot against the life of the Empress, on account of
the revolver in my possession, had condemned me to imprisonment in the
Fortress of Schlüsselburg. Its very name, dreaded by every Russian,
recurred to me as I recollected Kouropatkine's significant words. Had he
not threatened that, if I revealed one single word of the secret doings
of the holy Starets, my tongue would be cut out within those grim dark
walls of that prison of mystery?

We Russians had from our childhood heard of that sinister fortress, the
walls of which rise sheer from the black waters of Lake Ladoga--that
place where the cells of the political prisoners, victims of the thousand
and one intrigues of the Russian bureaucracy, consequent upon the
autocracy of the Tsar, are deep beneath the lake's surface, so that they
can--when it is willed by the Governor or those higher Ministers who
express their devilish desire--be flooded at will.

Hundreds of terrified, yet innocent and nameless victims of Russia's
mediæval barbarism, persons of both sexes--alas! that I should speak so
of my own country--have, during the past ten years of enlightenment,
stood in their narrow dimly-lit oubliette and watched in horror the black
tide trickle through the rat holes in the stone floor, slowly, ever
slowly, until water has filled the cell to the arched stone roof and
drowned them as rats in a trap.

And all that has been done by the accursed German wirepullers in the name
of the puny puppet who was Tsar, and from whom the truth was, they said,
ever carefully hidden.

The Kazan police treated me just as inhumanly as I expected. By my own
experience as an official in the Department of Political Police, and
knowing what I did in consequence, I was expecting all this.

Four days I spent in that gloomy, but not very uncomfortable cell in
Kazan, when, on the fifth morning, I was taken, handcuffed to another
prisoner who I found afterwards had murdered his wife, to the Volga
steamer which, after twelve hours of close confinement, landed us at
Nijni.

A hundred times I debated within myself whether it were best to remain
silent, and not reveal my past career in the Department of Political
Police, or to state the absolute facts and struggle by that means to
obtain a hearing and escape.

One fact was patent. General Kouropatkine and Boris Stürmer both trusted
in my silence, while the rascal monk had found in me a catspaw who had
remained dumb. In truth, however, my secret intention was to watch the
progress of events. Of the latter, Rasputin had, of course, no suspicion.
If I were--as I had already proved myself--his willing assistant, then he
and his friends might endeavour to save me.

Such were my thoughts as I sat in the train between two police agents on
the interminable journey from Nijni to the capital.

On arrival at the Nicholas Station the murderer to whom I was manacled
and myself were shown no consideration. We had been without food for
twelve hours, yet the three men in charge, though they ate a hearty meal
in the buffet, gave us not a drink of water. Humanity is not in the
vocabulary of our police of Russia when dealing with political suspects,
so many of whom are entirely innocent persons who have proved themselves
obnoxious to the corrupt bureaucracy.

We had two hours to wait in Petrograd, locked in one of the waiting-rooms
where we were at last given a hunk of bread and a piece of cold meat.
Then we were driven out to Schlüsselburg in a motor-car, arriving there
in the grey break of dawn and being conveyed by boat to the grim
red-brick fortress which rose from the lake.

Stepping from the boat on to the floating landing-stage we were conducted
by armed warders through the iron gate and along innumerable stone
corridors where, ever and anon, we passed other warders--men who,
criminals themselves, spent their lives in the fortress and were never
allowed to land in order that they might not reveal the terrible secrets
of that modern Bastille. Those who would form a proper opinion of our
Empire should remember that this horrible prison was at the disposal of
each of the Ministers and their sycophants, and that hundreds of entirely
innocent people of both sexes had for years been sent there out of
personal spite or jealousy, and also in the furtherance of Germany's aims
for the coming war.

Within those dark, gloomy walls, where many of the dimly lit cells were
below the lake, hundreds of patriotic Russians had ended their lives,
their only offence being that they had been too true to their Emperor and
their own land!

Ever since my childhood I had been taught to regard Schlüsselburg as an
inferno--a place from which no victim of our corrupt bureaucracy had ever
emerged. Only His Excellency the Governor and the under-Governor had for
years landed from that island fortress. To all others communication with
the outside world was strictly forbidden. Hence I was fully aware that
now I had set foot in the hateful place my identity had become lost, and
only death was before me.

And such deeds were being done in the name of the Tsar!

At the time I believed in His Majesty, feeling that he was in ignorance
of the truth. Nowadays I know that he was, all the time, fully aware of
the crimes committed in his name. Hence, I have no sympathy with the
Imperial family, and have welcomed its well-deserved downfall.

Into a small room where sat an official in uniform I was ushered, and
later, after waiting an hour, was compelled to sign the big
leather-bound register of prisoners. Already my crime had evidently been
written down in a neat official hand, yet I was given no opportunity to
read it.

"Enough!" said the big bearded officer with a wave of the hand. "Take him
to his cell--number 326."

Whereupon the three men who had conveyed me there bundled me down two
steep flights of damp stone steps, worn hollow by the tread of thousands
of those who had already gone down to their doom, into a corridor dimly
lit by oil-lamps--a passage into which no light of day ever penetrated.

There we were met by an evil-looking ex-convict who carried a key
suspended by a chain.

"Three-two-six!" shouted one of my guardians, whereupon the gaoler opened
a door and I was thrust into a narrow stone cell, the floor of which was
an inch deep in slime, faintly lit by a tiny aperture, heavily barred,
about ten feet above where I stood.

The door was locked behind me and I found myself alone. I was in one of
those oubliettes which at the will of my captors could be flooded!

I held my breath and glanced around. Within me arose a fierce resentment.
I had acted honestly towards my scoundrelly employers--though, be it
said, my object was one of patriotic observation--yet they had allowed me
to become the victim of the secret police who would, no doubt, obtain
great kudos, and probably a liberal _douceur_, for having unearthed "a
desperate plot against Her Majesty the Empress!"

That there was a plot was quite true--but one unsuspected by the Chief of
Police of Kazan.

My paroxysm of anger I need not here describe. Through the hours that
passed I sat upon the stone seat beside the board that served me as bed,
gazing up at the small barred window.

_Clap--clap--clap_ was the only sound that reached me--and with failing
heart I knew the noise to be that of waves of the lake beating upon the
wall within a few inches of my window, the dark waters which in due time
would no doubt rise through my uneven floor and engulf me. Big grey rats
ran about in search of fragments of food--of which there was none. I was
a "political," and my food would certainly not be plentiful.

In those awful nerve-racking hours, never knowing when I might find my
floor flooded as signal of a horrible death, I paced my cell uttering the
worst curses upon those who had employed me, and vowed that if they gave
me the grace--for their own ends--to escape I would use my utmost
endeavours to destroy them.

I did not blame the Okhrana or the Chief of Police of Kazan. They had
both acted in good faith. Yet I remembered that I was the catspaw of
Kouropatkine and of Stürmer, either of whom could easily order my
release. And that was what I awaited in patience, although in terror.

Days went by--hopeless, interminable days. The lapping of the waters
above me ever reminded me of the fate that had been of the many hundreds
who had previously occupied that same fearsome oubliette and had been
drowned, deliberately murdered by those into whose bad graces they had
fallen.

When the grey streak of light faded above me the gruff criminal in charge
would unbolt my door and bring me a small paraffin lamp to provide me
with light and warmth for the night. When the lamp was brought each night
I thought of Marie Vietroff whose name was still upon everyone's lips.
The poor girl, arrested though innocent as I had been, had been confined
in a cell in the fortress of Peter and Paul, and her fate was known in
consequence of certain revelations admitted by the Assistant Public
Prosecutor. This official, the tool of higher and more corrupt officials,
had admitted that the girl, though entirely innocent of any crime, had
been arrested out of spite and sent to the fortress where, to escape a
doom more horrible than death itself, she had emptied the oil from her
lamp over herself while in bed, and then set fire to it.

Often, even in that deep oubliette, the sounds of woman's shrieks reached
me, and each time I thought of the girl-victim of an official's revenge.

Days passed--so many that I lost count of them--until I had abandoned
hope. The scoundrels whom I had served had forsaken me now that I had
served their purpose. Rasputin had fascinated the Empress by that
mesmeric glance of his, and it had probably been deemed wiser that my
mouth should be at once closed. At any moment I might discover the water
oozing up between those green slime-covered stones.

One day, however, at about noon the gruff uncommunicative peasant who was
my gaoler--a man incarcerated for murder in Moscow--unlocked the door and
bade me come out.

In surprise I was taken along the corridors to that same small room in
which I had put down my name in that Book of Fate they called the Prison
Register, and there the same official informed me that it was desired to
interrogate me at the Ministry of the Interior in Petrograd.

Another interrogation! My spirits rose. If my captors meant to have the
truth, then they should have it. I would expose the plot, let me be
believed or disbelieved.

Escorted by two agents of police, I was taken out into the dazzling light
of day back to Petrograd, and to the Ministry of the Interior, where in a
private room--one that was in a wing of the great building familiar to
me--I was left alone.

I had only been there for a few minutes, looking out of the window in
wonder, when the door opened, and before me stood the goat-bearded man
Boris Stürmer.

"Welcome back, my dear Rajevski!" he exclaimed, coming towards me and
shaking my hand warmly. "We only knew yesterday where you were. Those
fools in Kazan spirited you away, but that idiot the Chief of Police has
been to-day dismissed the service for his meddling. I do hope you are
none the worse for your adventure," he added with concern.

"Surely Grichka knew of my arrest!" I said. "Did he not inquire?"

"He did not dare to do so openly, lest he himself should be implicated,"
replied the German. "We were compelled to wait and inquire with due
judiciousness. Even then we could not discover whither you had been
sent--not until yesterday. But it is all a mistake, my dear Rajevski--all
a mistake, and you must overlook it. The Father is eagerly awaiting your
return."

"I must first go home and exchange these dirty clothes," I remarked.

"Yes. But first accept the apologies of the General and myself. You, of
course, knew that we should extricate you--as we shall again, if any
other untoward circumstances happen to arise. Recollect that we can open
any door of prison or palace in Russia," and then he smiled grimly as I
took my leave.

I returned to my own rooms to find that they had, during my absence, been
searched by the police, and some of my correspondence, of a private and
family nature, had been taken away. At this I felt greatly annoyed, and
resolved to obtain from Kouropatkine immunity from such domiciliary
visits in future.

Upon my table lay a letter which had, I was told, arrived for me that
morning. On opening it I found that it was from the head office of the
Azof-Don Commercial Bank, in the Morskaya, officially informing me that a
sum of fifty thousand roubles had been placed to my credit there by some
person who remained anonymous.

The present was certainly a welcome one, made no doubt as reparation for
the inconvenience I had suffered.

Half-an-hour later I arrived at the Poltavskaya where old Anna admitted
me, and I at once went to the monk's sanctum.

Rasputin sprang from his chair and, seizing both my hands, cried:

"Ah! my dear Féodor! So here you are back with us! This relieves my mind
greatly."

"Yes," I said. "Back from the grave."

"The infernal idiots!" declared the monk, his wide-open eyes flashing as
he spoke. "I will see that it does not occur again. But you quite
understand, Féodor, that it was not wise to reveal that I had gone to
Kazan on purpose to pray in the Empress's presence."

I smiled, and said:

"Somebody has placed fifty thousand roubles to my account at the Azof-Don
Bank."

In turn the rascal smiled, and said:

"You need not seek its source. It is out of the Government funds, and is
yours. Keep a still tongue, and there may be other payments." Then,
turning to his table, he showed me quantities of correspondence which had
been left unattended in my absence, and urged me to get to work, adding:
"I have to be at the Baroness Tchelkounoff's this afternoon, and there is
a séance here to-morrow--five neophytes to be initiated."

So five more silly, neurotic and, of course, wealthy women were to be
initiated into the mysteries of the mock saint's religion. Grichka had no
use for those whose pockets were not well lined, for he was accumulating
vast sums from those weak, fascinated females who believed in his
divinity as healer and spiritual guide.

Presently I seated myself at the table and recommenced my secretarial
duties, while he went forth. In many letters were drafts for
subscriptions for Rasputin's convent in far-off Pokrovsky in Siberia, a
place which no one had ever visited, yet in support of which he had
obtained hundreds of thousands of roubles. I might here state that later
on, when I visited Pokrovsky, I found the wonderful convent, of which he
told me such pious stories, consisted of a plain house cheaply furnished
in which lived his peasant wife and children, together with twelve of his
chosen sister-disciples, foolish women who had made over their money to
him and devoted their lives to piety as set forth in his new "religion."

A fortnight passed. Of Kouropatkine we saw little. He had, at last,
assisted by the traitor Stössel and at Germany's instigation, succeeded
in forcing war with Japan, and the streets of the capital were filled
with urging, enthusiastic crowds bent upon pulling the Mikado from his
throne.

Kouropatkine had, according to what Rasputin told me, assured the Emperor
that the victory would be an easy one, and that the Japanese would fly at
first sight of our troops. The General had quite recently returned from
the Far East, and had presented a personal report to the Tsar describing
Japan's war preparations. He had declared that if Russia meant victory
she must strike at once. Hence war was declared; you know with what
disastrous results to both the Army and Navy of Russia.

It was, however, on the day before the declaration of war that Rasputin's
real triumph came. The Empress, who had been searching Russia high and
low for the pious Father beside whom she had knelt in Kazan, had at last
discovered him, and he received a command to an audience at the Palace of
Tsarskoe-Selo.

The monk, his eyes shining with glee, showed me the letter from Count
Fredericks, Minister of the Court, and said: "You must accompany me,
Féodor."

At noon on the day appointed we therefore left Petrograd together. The
monk wore, in pretended humility, his oldest and most rusty robe--though
beneath it, be it said, his under garments were of silk of the finest
procurable in the capital--while suspended by a thin brass chain around
his neck was a cheap enamelled cross. He was unkempt, unwashed, his face
sallow and drawn, yet those wonderful brilliant eyes stared forth with
uncanny intensity of expression. His hands were grimy, and his long
tapering finger-nails had not been cleaned for weeks. Such was the man
whom Alexandra Feodorovna, fascinated by his glance, had called to her
side.

On arrival at the station of Tsarskoe-Selo we found one of the Imperial
carriages awaiting us, with footman and coachman in bright blue liveries,
with outriders.

Two flunkeys, also in blue, advanced, and, placing their hands beneath
the saint's arms, lifted him into the carriage, an honour always paid to
those who are special guests of His Majesty the Tsar. As for myself I
climbed in afterwards, smiling within myself at the spectacle of the
unwashed monk being lifted in as though he were an invalid. With us was
an officer in uniform and a civilian--an agent of the Okhrana.

The moment we had seated ourselves the Imperial servants took off their
cocked hats and replaced them crosswise on their heads as sign that
within the carriage was a guest of His Majesty, and in order to signal to
passers-by as we drove along to remove their hats or salute.

Rasputin had already been given instructions by General Erchoff, Chief
Procurator of the Holy Synod, as to how we should act in the presence of
Her Imperial Majesty. We had both attended before him, Rasputin well
knowing that Erchoff was one of his most bitter enemies, but who on
account of the Tsaritza's interest was now posing as a friend.

After our drive back to Rasputin's house the monk, flinging himself into
a chair and lighting a cigarette, thoughtfully remarked:

"That puppet Erchoff will later on regret that he denounced me a year
ago. His term of office is at its limit."

The mock saint was possessed of an almost supernatural intuition. In
everyday life he would tell me of things that would happen socially and
politically, and sure enough they would happen. The gift of looking into
the future is given to a few men and women in the world, those persons
who sometimes when they look into the face of another hold their breath
and remain silent, because they see death written upon the countenance
before them. This curious faculty was possessed by Rasputin to a very
marked degree--a faculty which has puzzled scientists through all the
ages, a faculty which usually runs side by side with an overweening
vanity and an amazing self-consciousness. Sometimes the possessor of that
most astounding and mysterious intuition is also possessed of a humble
and retiring disposition. But it is seldom.

Grichka, as all Russia called him, was an outstanding personality,
clever, scheming, and as unscrupulous as he was avaricious. His mujik
blood betrayed itself every hour.

Even as we sat there in the Imperial carriage as we drove to the Palace,
he smiled with self-conscious sarcasm when the people saluted or doffed
their hats to him as an Imperial guest.

At last we arrived before huge prison-like gates, which opened to allow
us to pass, sentries saluted, the doors swung back again, and we found
ourselves in the great well kept park of the Alexander Palace.

I saw two civilians walking together along the drive, which led into a
wood. They were agents of the secret police patrolling the grounds, for
every precaution was being taken to guard the persons of Their Majesties.
The death of the girl Vietroff had aroused the indignation of Russia to
such an extent that the atmosphere was charged with anarchism.

Our road lay through woods, past a model dairy. Thence we went past two
large farms, and out into open meadow lands, everything being kept most
spick-and-span by the hundreds of servants.

The system of defence of Tsarskoe-Selo struck me as amazingly well
designed. The road we had driven along seemed to be a maze, for twice we
had left what appeared to be the main road, and passing three
guard-houses--small fortresses in themselves, in case of an attack by the
revolutionists--we at last arrived before the main entrance of the royal
residence, guarded by a detachment of fierce-looking Kubansky Cossacks.
These were drawn up standing at the salute, with their officers, as we
approached. It was surely a picturesque guard of honour, with their
quaint, old-fashioned pointed headgear, their smart comic-opera tunics,
and their long, shiny boots.

In a great high white wall is an elegant gate of delicately wrought
ironwork, with the usual striped sentry boxes on either side. Around are
seated Chinese statues in bronze, each upon its pedestal. Over the
gateway is the Imperial cipher in bronze, and beyond in the holy of
holies is the long two-storied palace of Tsarskoe-Selo, that spot
forbidden to all save to the guests of Their Majesties.

I give this in detail because few outsiders, very few indeed--save
ambassadors and other jackanapes in uniform--had, until the arrest of the
Romanoffs, ever trod within the hallowed precincts of the
palace-fortress, the bomb-proof home of the incompetent weakling who had
been crowned Tsar of All the Russias.

As we passed through that last gate I saw before us a building very much
like a French château of the sixteenth century, a long low building with
sloping slated roofs, few chimneys, and a clock--which, by the way, had
stopped--high over the entrance.

Everywhere since we had entered the Imperial domain all was most
scrupulously well kept. Not a gravel stone was out of place. Gangs of men
were, indeed, kept to rake over instantly the gravel drives so as to
obliterate the track of the wheels of the carriages.

At last with due pomp we drew up before the long portico of the
comfortable but not imposing house in which lived Their Imperial
Majesties.

As we descended an attendant took Rasputin's staff, when instantly there
came forward a lieutenant of Cossacks, a curiously crafty-looking fellow,
who asked us if we desired to wash, or wished for a drink or for food.

The fellow was repulsive, even to the charlatan himself. The latter gazed
at him, and replied in his deep, serious tones:

"I am here to see our Empress. I have no need for thy ministrations."

At this rebuke the evil-looking officer looked daggers, and seeing that I
was but a menial as secretary he did not deign to address me.

A few seconds later we were taken in charge by the "skorochodi," servants
who are so intelligent that they are nicknamed the "quick-walkers." The
palace contains hundreds of servants and hangers-on, but these are the
ones picked to take visitors through the semicircular built palace to
audience of either the Tsar or his spouse.

Through a long corridor we were conducted past the doors of a number of
rooms. At each were two sentries, one a big Abyssinian negro in blue and
gold--called an "Araby" in the palace--and the other a stolid Cossack
sentry with his fixed bayonet.

At the end of the corridor we were met by one of the Emperor's personal
servants who came forward in all humility, and bowing before Rasputin,
asked.

"Can I be of service, Father, before you have audience?"

Both of us were surprised. Here, in the midst of all the pomp and
ceremony was an ordinary Russian peasant, as unlettered and as uncouth as
Rasputin himself, and a personal attendant of his Majesty.

He ushered us into a pretty room, with a long balcony upholstered in pale
grey silk, with thick soft carpet to match, an apartment which might have
been the boudoir of the Empress herself.

"I am here at Her Imperial Majesty's command," replied the Father, ready
for the crowning of the slow and subtle plot which Stürmer had engineered
with Kouropatkine. "She desires to speak with me."

Next instant the servant, who no doubt knew of Grichka's wonder-working
with his mock miracles, threw himself upon his knees, and craved:

"Oh, our Father, I beseech thee to place thy blessing upon me, and upon
my wife and my invalid child. The doctor who came yesterday said that she
is suffering from phthisis, and that the case is serious. I beg of thee
to cure her."

"Thy name?" he asked quickly, looking straight into his face with those
wonderful eyes.

"Aivasoff--Ivan Aivasoff."

"Whence do you come?"

"From Ossa, in the Government of Perm."

"And you are His Majesty's valet, eh?"

"I am one of His Imperial Majesty's valets. He told me that the Tsaritza
had commanded you here, and that I was to introduce you and your
secretary, Féodor Rajevski."

Rasputin halted, and assuming his most pious demeanour--that same
attitude which had attracted Petrograd society--and incidentally
extracted hundreds of thousands of roubles from its pockets--crossed his
hands, muttered some words, and bestowed his blessing upon the Tsar's
body servant.

A minute later the man Aivasoff straightened himself and, pointing to a
door on the opposite side of the room, asked:

"Are you both ready? The Tsaritza is awaiting you."

Rasputin, though pretending to be careless of his personal appearance,
stroked his long beard, and then announced his readiness to pass into the
presence of the Empress.

"You will go first, and bow," said our attendant. "Your secretary will
remain within the door with hands crossed before him," he said.

Then with his knuckles he rapped thrice upon the white enamelled door,
and, turning the handle of the lock, entered, walking before to announce
us.

In front I saw a deep glow of electricity shaded with daffodil silk, a
pretty artistic room with high palms, choice cut flowers, and soft
luxurious couches upholstered in grey and gold brocade. There sat two
ladies, one of whom was in a silk gown of bottle green, which was, no
doubt, the latest creation of the Rue de la Paix--the Empress--while the
other, who was in elegant black, I afterwards recognised as her bosom
friend who had accompanied her to Kazan, Mademoiselle Zéneide Kamensky.

Ivan Aivasoff bowed low as he uttered his stereotyped words of
introduction. He was one of those ignorant persons with whom the
unscrupulous bureaucrats had surrounded the person of the Tsar. He was an
honest, well-meaning fellow from the Urals, who had been selected to
pose as a palace official, and to act just as I was acting, as the tool
of others; a peasant chosen because he would naturally be less affected
by revolutionary and progressive influence.

Aivasoff was, as I afterwards learnt, but one of many peasants in
immediate contact with the Emperor and Empress, the other servants being
German.

As we bowed before the two ladies they rose smiling, while the Father
with raised hands pronounced upon them his blessing in that pious,
slightly hoarse, but deeply impressive voice of his. Then, after the
Empress had welcomed him he fixed her with that impelling, hypnotic gaze
of his, and in pretence of never having met her before, exclaimed:

"O Gracious Lady, I have come here at thy bidding, though I am but a poor
and unlettered wanderer, unfamiliar with palaces. My sphere is in the
houses of the very poor in order to direct, to advise, and to succour
them. Such is God's will."

"Already, Father, we have heard of you," responded the Empress,
fascinated by the extraordinary thraldom of his gaze. "Your great
charitable works are well known to us, as they are known through the
length and breadth of our Empire. It is said by many that you have been
sent unto us as saviour of Russia."

"Yes--it is so, by God's Almighty grace," the mock saint said, bowing low
at the Empress's words, while Mademoiselle Kamensky exchanged inquiring
glances with myself.

That scene was, indeed, a strange one, the dirty, unkempt monk in his
faded, ragged habit, greasy at collar and sleeves, his black matted beard
sweeping across his chest, and his hair uncombed, standing erect and
rather imperious, posing as a Divine messenger, in that luxurious private
apartment of the Empress herself.

"It is but right that you, as our spiritual guide, should be in direct
touch with the Emperor and myself," she said, without, however, referring
to the meeting at Kazan, to which I had certainly expected she would
allude. "From our friend Stürmer I have learnt much concerning your good
works, Father, and I wish to support them financially, if I may be
permitted, just as I did those of Father Gapon."

"Truly I thank thee, O Lady," he replied, bowing low again. "My convent
at Pokrovsky is in urgent need of funds."

"Then I shall give orders for you to receive a donation immediately," she
said in a low voice, and with that pronounced German accent which always
reminded those with whom she came into contact that she was not a
true-born Russian. "Stolypin, too, has told me of the wonderful miracle
you performed in Warsaw."

I knew of that miracle, an outrageous fraud which had been perpetrated
upon an assembly of ignorant peasants by means of a clever conjuring
trick in which Rasputin's friend, the chemist Badmayev, and another, had
assisted. Stürmer had been laughing heartily over it at Rasputin's house
on the previous night.

"God hath given me strength," replied the monk simply, and with much
humbleness. "I am His servant, sent by Him unto Russia as her guide and
her deliverer. As such I am before thee."

As he stood there with devout piety written upon his sallow, shrunken
countenance, he certainly presented a most saintly, picturesque
appearance, his attitude being that of a most humble ascetic of the
Middle Ages. Saint Francis of Assisi could not have been humbler.

That Her Majesty was much impressed by the crafty charlatan was quite
apparent. In that strange jumble of quotations from the Scriptures which
he so often used, he declared to her that by Divine command he intended
to guide Russia in her forthcoming progress and prosperity, so that she
should rise to become the all-powerful nation of Europe.

"It is well, O Lady, that thou hast sent for me," he added. "I am thy
most devoted servant. I am entirely in thy hands."

And again crossing his begrimed hands upon his breast he raised his eyes
to Heaven, and repeated his blessing in that same jumbled jargon which he
used at the weekly séances of the sister-disciples.

"O Father, I sincerely thank you," replied Her Majesty at last. "The
Emperor is unfortunately away in Moscow, but when he returns you must
again come to us, for I know he will welcome you warmly. We are both
striving for the national welfare, and if we receive your goodwill we
shall have no fear of failure."

"There are, alas! rumours of plots against the dynasty," said Rasputin.
"But, O Lady, I beg of thee to heed these my words and remain calm and
secure, for although attempts may be made, desperate perhaps, it is
willed that none will be successful. God in His grace is Protector of the
House of Romanoff, to whom a son will assuredly soon be born."

Alexandra Feodorovna held her breath at hearing those words. That scene
before the shrine of Our Lady of Kazan was, no doubt, still vivid in her
mind.

"Are you absolutely confident of that?" she asked him in breathless
suspense.

"The truth hath already been revealed unto me. Therefore I know," was his
reply. "I know--and I here tell thee, O Lady. The Imperial House will
have a son and heir."

That prophecy, duly fulfilled as it was later on, caused the Empress to
regard the dissolute "saint" as a "holy" man. In that eventful hour at
Tsarskoe-Selo the die was cast. The Empress had fallen irrevocably
beneath the spell of the amazing rascal, and the death-knell of the
Romanoffs as rulers had been sounded.

When we backed out of the Empress's presence the peasant Ivan, who had
introduced us, handed us over to the Tsar's chief valet, an elderly
grey-bearded man in the Imperial livery, a man whose name we understood
was Tchernoff, and who had been valet of the old Emperor Alexander III.

The Starets left the palace full of extreme satisfaction, and indeed,
when an hour later we were alone together in the train returning to
Petrograd, he grinned evilly across at me, and said meaningly:

"Alexandra Feodorovna did not forget our meeting at Kazan, though she did
not allude to it. Ere long, though she is Empress, I intend that she
shall sit at my feet and do my bidding!"

And he chuckled within himself as was his peasant's habit when mightily
pleased.

Truly, that meeting with the Tsar's valet Tchernoff was quite as fateful
to Russia as the meeting with the neurotic spiritualistic Empress
herself.




CHAPTER III

THE POTSDAM PLOT DEVELOPS


ABOUT a week after Rasputin's first audience of the Empress Alexandra,
the Bishop Theophanus, confessor of the Imperial family, paid him a visit
at the Poltavskaya.

The Bishop, a big, over-fed man, had a long chat with the Starets in my
presence.

"Her Majesty was very much impressed by you, my dear Grichka," said the
well-known cleric to the man who, having pretended to abandon his
profligate ways, had parted his hair in the middle and become a pilgrim.
"She has daily spoken of you, and you are to be commanded to audience
with the Tsar. Hence I am here to give you some advice."

The "holy" man grinned with satisfaction, knowing how complete had been
the success of Stürmer's plans. At the moment Theophanus was in ignorance
of the deeply laid plot to draw the Empress beneath the spell of the
Starets whom the inferior classes all over Russia--as well as the
well-to-do--believed was leading such a saint-like, ascetic life in
imitation of Christ.

Truly, Grichka dressed the part well, and gave himself the outward
appearance of saintliness and godliness. Even the Bishop was bamboozled
by him, just as Petrograd society was being mystified and electrified by
the rising of "the Divine Protector" of Russia.

Of his doctrine I need not here write. Dark hints of its astonishing
immorality have already leaked out to the world through chattering women
who were members of the cult. My object here is to expose the most subtle
and ingenious plot which the world has known--the Teutonic conspiracy
against our Russian Empire.

Rasputin's "religion" was not a novel one, as is generally supposed. It
was simply a variation conceived by his mystically-inclined mind upon the
one devised by Marcion in the early days of the Christian era. He had
conceived the theory that the only means by which the spirit could be
elevated was to mortify and destroy the flesh.

The Bishop Teofan, or Theophanus, was a mock ascetic, just as was
Rasputin. Bishop Alexis of Kazan, after Rasputin's visit there, had
introduced him to the Rector of the Religious Academy, and already the
mock saint had established a circle of ascetic students, of whom Teofan
and another Starets named Mitia the Blessed (a name derived from Dmitry),
who came from Montenegro, were members. But Rasputin, although the
leader, had entirely imposed upon Teofan.

In all seriousness the Bishop told the Starets of the interest in him
which the Empress had aroused in the mind of the Tsar.

"He is a keen spiritualist, just as is the Empress," said the confessor.
"At Court everyone has heard of your marvellous powers. I can promise you
great success if you carry out the views I will place before you. You
must form a Court circle of disciples. The woman most likely to assist
you is Madame Vyrubova, who, with Mademoiselle Kamensky, is Her Majesty's
greatest confidante."

"Very well, I will meet her. You arrange it."

"To-morrow is Monday, and there will be the usual clerical reception at
the Countess Ignatieff's. I will see that she is there to meet you."

"Excellent, my dear Teofan!" said the "saint." "In this affair we will
help each other. I will form a circle of believers at Court, and
Alexandra Feodorovna shall be at their head."

The fact is that Teofan knew that Rasputin was possessed of a marvellous
hypnotic power, and, being aware of the vogue of hypnotists at Court, saw
in the Starets an able assistant by whom to gain power in the immediate
entourage of Their Majesties. Thus, quite unconsciously, he was
furthering the plans of Kouropatkine and Stürmer, who were receiving
money from Berlin.

Already one of Rasputin's principal disciples was Madame Golovine, the
elder sister of the Grand Duke Paul's morganatic wife, Countess
Hohenfelsen, a woman who had become his most ardent follower, and who
never failed to attend, with her two daughters, the famous séances held
weekly in that big upstairs room.

On the following evening I went with Rasputin to the great house of the
Dowager Countess Ignatieff to attend the usual Monday gathering of
prelates and ascetics, for her salon was a rendezvous for all kinds of
religious cranks, theologians, and people interested in pious works.
Rasputin's unexpected appearance there caused a sensation.

Outside his circle of "disciples" he was unapproachable. The instructions
given me by Boris Stürmer were absolute and precise. The reason that I
was always at the charlatan's right hand was because he could only write
with difficulty, and was therefore unable to make any memoranda. His
letters were the painful efforts of an unlettered mujik, as indeed he
was.

And yet already he had become the most renowned man in the Russian
capital!

Our Empire's quarrel with Japan had not been finally settled. The country
was in a state of serious unrest. While the revolutionary spirit, started
by the death of the girl Vietroff, was seething everywhere, the dynasty
was threatened on every hand. Yet the ever-open eye of the Okhrana was
upon everyone, and arrests of innocent persons were still continuing.

That night the salon of the Countess Ignatieff was responsible for much
concerning the downfall of the Romanoffs. In the great luxurious
drawing-room there were assembled beneath the huge crystal electroliers a
curious, mixed company of the pious and the vicious of the capital. There
was the Metropolitan in his robes and with his great crucifix, Ministers
of State in uniforms with decorations, Actual Privy Councillors and their
wives, and dozens of underlings in their gaudy tinsel, prelates with
crosses at their necks, and women of all classes, from the highest
aristocracy to the painted sister of the higher demi-monde.

The gathering was characteristic of Petrograd in those times of Russia's
decadence, when Germany was preparing for war. The fight with Japan had
already been engineered through Kouropatkine as a preliminary to the
betrayal and smashing of our Empire.

Of the conflict with the Mikado I have no concern. My pen is taken up in
order to reveal what I know regarding the astounding plots conceived in
Potsdam and executed in Petrograd, in order fearlessly to expose those
who were traitors to their country, and to whom the _débâcle_ of 1917 was
due.

In that great well-lit saloon, crowded by religious personages of all
kinds, the old Dowager Countess Ignatieff, in stiff black silk, came
forward to receive the popular Starets as the newest star in Russia's
religious firmament. With Stürmer behind him to advise and to plot, aided
by an obscure civil servant named Protopopoff--who afterwards became
Minister of the Interior and a spy of Germany--the "saint" never held
himself cheap. That was one of the secrets of his astounding career.
Though he possessed no education and could scarcely trace his own name,
he possessed the most acute brain of any lawyer or banker in Petrograd.
In every sense he was abnormal, just as abnormal as Joan of Arc, Saint
Anthony, Saint Francis, or a dozen others who have been beatified.

The rheumatic old countess, after shaking hands with us both, introduced
us to a dozen other persons around her. Suddenly she said:

"Ah! Here is my dear friend the Lady-of-the-Court Anna Vyrubova. Allow me
to introduce you, Father."

The Starets instantly crossed his hands piously over his breast and bowed
before a good-looking, sleek-faced woman of forty, who was elegantly
dressed, and who greeted him with a humorous smile. Having heard much of
the woman's scandalous past, I naturally regarded her with considerable
curiosity. She was a woman of destiny. Petrograd had not long before been
agog with the scandal following her marriage with a young naval officer,
who had gone to the Baltic, and unexpectedly returning to his wife's room
in the palace at Tsarskoe-Selo, had been shut out by the Empress herself.
The husband had afterwards died in mysterious circumstances, which had
been hushed up by the police, and madame had remained as the personal
attendant upon Her Majesty with her inseparable friend Zéneide Kamensky.

As I watched the monk's meeting with this woman of adventure, I saw that
he had at once fascinated her, just as completely as he had hypnotised
her Imperial mistress. She stood before him, using her small black fan
slowly, for the room was overpoweringly hot, and began to chat, assuring
him that she had for a long time been desirous of meeting him.

As I stood beside Rasputin I heard him say, in that humble manner which
always attracted society women:

"And, O Lady, I have heard of thee often. It is with sincere pleasure
that I gaze upon thy face and speak with thee. It is God's will--let Him
be thanked for this our meeting."

The blasphemy of it all appalled me. I knew of certain deep plots in
progress, and I watched the handsome lady-in-waiting, with whom the monk
crossed the room, nodding self-consciously to the bishops, prelates, and
mock-pious scoundrels of all sorts, with their female victims. I held my
breath in wonder.

As I followed I saw Stürmer, the goat-bearded traitor, standing chatting
to a pretty young girl in turquoise blue. Then I overheard Madame
Vyrubova say to the Starets:

"I came here to-night, Father, especially to meet you. Her Majesty gave
me a message. She is in despair. She requires your help, prayers, and
advice."

"Ah! my dear lady, I regret; I am fully alive to the high honours which
our Tsaritza has done me to command me to Court. But my sphere is with
the poor. My life is with them--for their benefit and guidance."

"I bear you a message," said the well-preserved woman of whom a thousand
tongues had gossiped evilly in Petrograd. "To-morrow the Empress expects
you informally. She will take no refusal."

"Refusal--how can I refuse my Empress?" he replied. "I can beg of her to
excuse me. I have to attend a meeting in the lowest quarter of the city
to-morrow among those who await me. And in the evening I go upon a
pilgrimage. Her Majesty will not begrudge the poor my ministrations.
Please tell her this. My sphere, as designed by God, is with the masses
and not in the Imperial Palace."

That was all I overheard. Stürmer called me aside to whisper, and as he
did so I saw that the Starets had at once become surrounded by women, of
whom he always became the centre of attraction, with hands crossed so
humbly over his breast.

His refusal to go to Court was in accordance with his extraordinary
intuition and acumen, though his meeting with the woman Vyrubova marked
another milestone in the history of Russia's betrayal.

The days passed. The world was, of course, in ignorance, but we in the
Poltavskaya, the monk and myself, knew of the despatch of Admiral
Rozhdestvensky's blundering fleet on its voyage half-way round the world,
how he was ordered to fire upon anything he saw in the North Sea, and
how, as soon came out, he fired upon some of your British trawlers on
the Dogger Bank, for which our Government paid quite willingly sixty-five
thousand pounds in compensation.

But let the first war-chapter of Russia's history pass. With it Rasputin
had but little to do. The person who, unwilling or not, carried out the
will of Potsdam's Kaiser was the Empress Alexandra. And having done so
she, with her curious nature, suddenly turned from gay to grave. She
became strange in her conduct and discarded her wonderful Paris gowns--in
which, by the way, she was eclipsed by "Liane," the dark-haired diva of
the Paris _cafés chantants_, in whom Nicholas II. took such a very
paternal interest.

Time after time I had been present when Stürmer and Rasputin, chuckling
over the undoubted success of their conspiracy, discussed the situation.

Since Her Majesty had met the rascal monk at Tsarskoe-Selo she had never
appeared in public. On certain occasions, when a Court pageant or
function had to be held according to custom and the calendar, it was the
Emperor's mother who, with her well-known charm and honesty, received the
guests. Excuses were made for Alexandra Feodorovna's non-appearance. The
truth was that the Empress, full of spiritualistic beliefs, had suddenly
developed a religious mania, centred around the amazing personality of
the mock monk.

Thrice had Her Majesty sent him commands through her pro-German puppet
Fredericks, and thrice he, at Stürmer's suggestion, refused to comply.
This illiterate Siberian monk, ex-horse-thief and betrayer of women,
actually disregarded the Imperial order! He had declared himself to be
the saviour of Russia, and greater than the Romanoffs.

"The Empress is furious!" declared the Bishop Teofan one day as, with his
heavy bejewelled cross upon his breast and wearing clothes of the richest
texture, he sat with the rascal in his den. "Sometimes she is in anger,
at others in despair. Anna Vyrubova is frantic. Why do you not come to
audience?"

"She promised that I should see Nicholas," was the reply. "After I have
spoken with him I will see her. It does a woman good to wait."

"I agree, but your refusal may be stretched too far," said the Bishop.

"None will tell the truth concerning her," Rasputin said. "I hear on one
hand that she thinks herself too fat and is taking the 'Entfettungscur'
against the advice of the Court physician. Others say that she has eczema
and dare not show her face, while others say she is mad. What is the
truth?"

"Come and ascertain for yourself."

"Her devotion is that of a fanatic--I take it?"

"Exactly. She lives only for the entertainment of monks and pilgrims. You
are lucky, my dear Grichka. Madame Vyrubova was evidently entranced by
you at Countess Ignatieff's. She will do your bidding. Only, I beg of you
to come to Court."

The charlatan, however, steadily refused the Bishop's advice. Instead, he
left Petrograd that night alone, and went away to his wife and
sister-disciples at Pokrovsky, in Siberia.

For more than two months he was absent from Petrograd. One day a frantic
message came to me over the telephone from Madame Vyrubova, who inquired
the whereabouts of the Starets.

"The Father has gone to his convent at Pokrovsky, Madame," I replied.

"What!" she gasped. "Gone to Siberia! Why, Her Majesty is daily expecting
him here at the Palace. When will he return?"

"I regret, Madame, that I cannot say," was my reply. "He has told me
nothing."

"Will you please take a confidential message to Boris Stürmer for me?"
she asked. And when I replied in the affirmative, she went on:

"Please go at once to him and ask him to come to the Palace this evening
without fail. I am very anxious to see him concerning a highly important
matter. A carriage will meet the train which arrives at seven-thirty."

I promised to carry out the wishes of the Tsaritza's favourite
lady-in-waiting, and half an hour later called upon Stürmer at his fine
house in the Kirotshnaya, where I delivered the message.

During the next few weeks I merely called at the Poltavskaya each morning
for the monk's letters, which I opened and dealt with at my leisure.

His correspondence was truly amazing. The letters were mostly from
wealthy female devotees, missives usually couched in pious language. Some
contained confessions of the most private nature, and asking the Father's
advice and blessing. All these latter he had given me strict instructions
carefully to preserve. Any letter which contained self-condemnation by
its writer, or any confession of sin, was therefore carefully put away,
after being duly replied to. At the time, it did not occur to me that the
impostor ever intended to allow them to see the light of day, and,
indeed, it was not until several years later that I discovered that he
was using them for the purpose of extracting large sums from women who
preferred to pay the blackmail he levied rather than have their secrets
exposed to their sweet-hearts or husbands.

While Rasputin, having thrown off his cloak of piety, was leading a
dissolute life in far-off Pokrovsky, and refusing to obey the Empress's
repeated invitations, the guns of Peter and Paul one day boomed forth
salvo after salvo, announcing to the world that the prayer uttered by the
Starets before our Lady of Kazan had been granted.

An heir had been born to the Romanoffs!

There was but little public rejoicing, however, for Russia was, at the
moment, plunged into grief over the disastrous result of her attack upon
Japan. Nevertheless, the event more than ever impressed upon the neurotic
Empress that Grichka was possessed of some mysterious and divine
influence. Her Majesty believed entirely in his saintliness, and her
faith in the power of his prayers was complete. God had granted his
prayer and sent an heir to the Romanoffs because of his purity and
perfect piety. Already she was wondering whether, in some mysterious way,
the child's life was not linked with that of the holy Father whom the
Almighty had sent to protect her son's existence.

Because of this the Empress sent to Rasputin, at Pokrovsky, a number of
telegrams, which eventually the monk gave over to me to docket and put
away with the incriminating letters of his foolish and fascinated
admirers. The women of Russia, from the Empress to the lowly
superstitious peasant, were now at the charlatan's feet.

One telegram from Alexandra Feodorovna read as follows:

     "Father and Protector of our House, why do you refuse to come and
     give us comfort? God has given the Romanoffs an heir, and we
     desire your counsel and your prayers. Do, I beg of you, return to
     sustain us with your presence. When we met our conversation
     remained unfinished. I confess that I doubted then, but I now
     believe. Make haste and come at once to us. From your
     sister--ALEXANDRA."

Of this appeal the Starets took no notice. He preferred the society of
his sister-disciples at Pokrovsky to that of the Tsaritza. Besides, was
it not part of his clever plan to place the Empress beneath his influence
by bringing her to the brink of despair? He had not yet met Nicholas II.,
and it was his intention to place his amazing and mysterious grip upon
him also at the crucial moment. So again the Empress sent him a
communication--a letter written in her own hand, and delivered by one of
the Imperial couriers.

     "Why do you still hesitate?" she asked. "I sent you word by Anna
     [Madame Vyrubova] that I desired eagerly to see you again. Your
     good works are to-day in everyone's mouth. All at Court are
     speaking of you and your beautiful soul-inspiring religion, of
     which I am anxious to know more details from your own lips. It
     is too cruel of you to sever yourself from Petrograd when all are
     longing for your presence. What can I do in order to induce you
     to come? Ask of me anything, and your wish shall be granted. Do
     reply.--ALEXANDRA."

Again he treated her invitation with contempt, for following this, ten
days later, she sent him another telegram:

     "If you still refuse to come I will send Anna to you to try and
     induce you to reconsider the situation. Nicholas is extremely
     anxious to consult you. Father, I again implore you to come to
     us.--A."

Rasputin, who had created such a favourable impression upon the
lady-in-waiting Vyrubova, certainly had no intention of allowing her to
go to Pokrovsky and see the sordid home which Russia believed to be a
wonderful "monastery," and to which Petrograd society had subscribed so
freely. He therefore sent Her Majesty a message--the first response she
extracted--to the effect that he was leaving for Petrograd as soon as it
was possible to fulfil his Divine "call."

In the meantime I had been introduced by Boris Stürmer, whom I met almost
daily, to Stolypin, a friend of Rasputin's principal disciple in
Petrograd, Madame Golovine, and to Monsieur Raeff, who afterwards, by
Rasputin's influence, received the appointment of Procurator of the Holy
Synod. At Stürmer's fine house there were, in the absence of the Starets,
constant meetings of Raeff, General Kurloff, the Chief of the Political
Police, and a beetle-browed official named Kschessinski, who was director
of that secret department of State known as "the Black Cabinet," a suite
of rooms in the central postal bureau in Petrograd, where one's
correspondence was daily under examination for the benefit of the corrupt
Ministers and their place-seeking underlings. In addition, at these
dinners, followed by the secret conferences, there attended a certain
smart, well-set-up officer named Miassoyedeff, a colonel stationed at
Wirballen on the East Prussia frontier, and who had received gracious
invitations from the Kaiser to go shooting and to hob-nob with him. This
man afterwards became a spy of Germany, as I will later on reveal.

Kurloff, as head of the Political Police, had, before my appointment as
secretary to the Starets, been my superior, and therefore I well knew the
wheels within the wheels of his department. Naturally he was
hand-in-glove with the director of the Black Cabinet, the doings of which
would require a whole volume to themselves, and to me it was evident that
some further great and deep laid plot was in progress, of which Rasputin
was to be the head director.

One day in the Nevski I met Mitia the Blessed, the Starets who ran
Rasputin so closely in the public favour. I saw he was hopelessly
intoxicated, and was being followed by a crowd of jeering urchins. I did
not, however, know that Stürmer and his friends had arranged this
disgraceful exhibition of unholiness in order to discredit and destroy
Grichka's rival. Five minutes later I met the Bishop Theophanus walking
with the Procurator of the Holy Synod, who, like myself, witnessed the
degrading sight, and from that moment Mitia the Blessed no longer
exercised power, and was not further invited to the salons of those
mystical members of the aristocracy. He had been swept into oblivion in a
single day.

Rasputin at last returned, forced to do so by the determined attitude of
the Empress, who without doubt was suffering from serious religious
mania, as well as an acute form of neurotic heart disease. The monk
arrived quite unexpectedly at the Poltavskaya, and rang me up on the
telephone late one evening.

The Bishop Theophanus was, I found, with him. He knew of his arrival, and
had come from Peterhof to meet him and urge him to go next day and see
the Empress.

"If it is thy wish, I will," replied the "saint" with some reluctance,
for he knew too well that already he wielded an unbounded influence over
the Tsaritza. The fellow whose record was the worst imaginable, and
whose very nickname, "Rasputin," meant in Russian "the dissolute," was
regarded by the Empress as possessed of divine power, and as saviour of
Russia and protector of the Imperial family and its heir.

"I hear that Alexis, Bishop of Kazan, has turned your enemy, and has
written to the Holy Synod regarding your questionable monastery at
Pokrovsky," remarked Theophanus. "It is very regrettable."

"Bah! my dear friend. I have no fear," declared the man whose vanity was
so overweening. "Soon you will see that Nicholas himself will do my
bidding. I shall play the tune, and he will dance. All appointments will,
ere long, be in my hands, and I will place one of our friends as
Procurator of the Holy Synod."

At the moment I was inclined to laugh at such bombastic assertion.
Little, indeed, did I dream that within twelve months his prophecy would
be fulfilled, and that the ex-horse-stealer, whose secretary I had
become, would actually rule Russia through the lethargic weakling who sat
upon the throne as Tsar Nicholas II.

A week later I accompanied the Starets to have his first audience with
His Majesty the Emperor at the Palace of Peterhof, that wonderful
Imperial residence where the great Samson Fountain in gilded bronze
throws up from the lion's jaws a thick jet seventy feet high, in
imitation of Versailles, and where nearly six hundred servants were
employed in various capacities. We passed the Marly Pond, where the carp
were called by the ringing of a bell, and the Marly Cascade, where water
runs over twenty gilded marble steps. Truly, the beauties of Peterhof
were a revelation to the Starets and myself. On the previous day he had
had audience of the Empress at Tsarskoe-Selo, but I had not been present,
therefore I remained in ignorance of what had transpired. All I know is
that he returned home and drank a whole bottle of champagne to himself,
in full satisfaction--not that he cared for the wine, for his peasant
taste favoured the fiery vodka.

On entering Peterhof we were met by the valet Tchernoff, who greeted
Rasputin very warmly with some meaning words, and said:

"His Majesty is in his private cabinet expecting you. Come."

Another valet took our hats and overcoats, and then Tchernoff led us up a
great flight of marble stairs, and on through nearly a dozen panelled
rooms with historic portraits, much like those I had once passed through
at Fontainebleau, until he entered the blue drawing-room, a great,
old-fashioned, eighteenth-century apartment adorned by a number of
magnificent pictures by Saltzmann.

Your British public have never truly realised the gorgeousness of the
Palace at Peterhof, or the fact that in the Imperial service at the
various residences there were no fewer than four thousand domestics, most
of them useless and all uniformed. The "Arabys," imported especially from
Abyssinia, and who wore fantastically embroidered blue and gold uniforms
with a great crimson sash, and a kind of turban upon their heads, were
simply well-paid puppets, who added pomp to the gorgeous salons, the
doors of which they guarded.

As we passed through the great rooms on our way to the Tsar's private
cabinet, a hundred servants and officials bowed to us, but Rasputin
remained quite unimpressed. He was possessed of a most astounding
intuition, and he knew that by his mystical practices, his mock piety,
and by apparently ignoring the Imperial pair that success was assured.

At last we stood before the door of the autocrat's room, which Tchernoff
threw open unceremoniously, when we were confronted by His Majesty, who
wore a rough tweed shooting-suit, presenting anything but an Imperial
figure. I had expected to see him in uniform, like the thousand and one
pictures which purport to represent him, instead of which I found a very
ordinary-looking, bearded man, with deep-set eyes, a wan countenance, and
rather lank hair. He was square-built, a trifle below the medium height,
and a man whom, had you passed him in the Nevski, you might have taken
for a Jew tailor or a small tradesman. But the room itself was a
beautiful one, like all the apartments in Peterhof, semicircular in
shape, with a great bay window looking out upon the wonderful fountains,
all of which were throwing up their jets, with a great vista of greenery
beyond.

The Tsar bowed as the Starets, crossing himself, bestowed his blessing
upon him. The owner of twenty palaces and seven hundred million acres of
land turned his eyes to the carpet humbly as the mock saint uttered those
words of incomprehensible jargon which half Russia believed to be
inspired by the Divine will.

When Rasputin spoke His Majesty seemed cowed and thoughtful. Over his
whole frame was written fear and exhaustion. His voice was hollow when he
replied, and his glance was full of anticipation. At every gesture of the
Starets he seemed startled.

Was it any wonder when one recollected, so many were the plots against
the dynasty, that at the moment he had removed from Tsarskoe-Selo, where
a gang of a thousand men were engaged in digging deep trenches around the
palace because the Okhrana had got wind of a desperate plot to tunnel
beneath the Imperial residence and blow it up together with its Imperial
occupiers.

His Majesty addressed the Starets as "thee" and "thou."

"I know, Father, that thou art our guide and saviour," said the autocrat,
when together we were seated in the window, Rasputin explaining that he
always took me with him in order that I might take mental notes of
conversations and decisions.

"Féodor is mute," he added. "And he is part of myself."

Then His Majesty referred to Rasputin's "miracles" which he had performed
in Warsaw, Kiev, and other places, mere conjuring tricks which had held
the peasants speechless in amazement.

"Theophanus has told us of them. Thou hast healed the sick and cured the
lame," said His Majesty. "Truly, thou art greater in Russia than
myself."

"Pardon, your Majesty," replied the impostor humbly, "I am but God's
messenger, but thou art Tsar. It is not for me to exert authority, only
to pray unceasingly for the Empire and for the well-being of its Imperial
House. Theophanus hath, I hope, told thee that I seek no emoluments, no
advancement, no favour, no honour; I am but the humble Starets--a pilgrim
who hopes one day to see Mount Athos, there to retire in devotion."

"Theophanus has told me much," said the Emperor. "He has told me how at
spiritualistic séances thou canst work thy will with our departed, and
how at the house of our dear Stürmer not long ago thou didst obtain
communication with the spirit of my dear father Alexander. Truly, thy
powers are great, and we have need of thee. Why didst thou refuse to come
to us even though the Empress sent thee so many commands?"

"Because, as I have replied to Her Majesty, I am no courtier. My work
lies in the homes of the poor, not in the palaces."

"Ah, no," laughed the autocrat with good humour. "Thou art truly sent to
us to save Russia. Thy place is here, in our own home."

I drew a long breath when I heard the Tsar pronounce those words, for
they showed quite plainly the strong, invincible grip the impostor had,
by posing with unconcern, already obtained upon the Imperial family and
the Court.

The Starets crossed himself, and again bowed. I was amazed to witness the
crass ignorance and astounding superstition displayed by the Emperor of
Russia, whom all Europe believed to be a progressive, wideawake monarch.
That he possessed a spiritualistic kink, as did also his German wife, was
quite apparent. Any bogus medium or charlatan could easily impose upon
him. A dozen men and women who, by their vagaries and pretended powers,
had brought psychic studies into ridicule, had given séances before the
Emperor, and had told him things which his crafty entourage had already
paid them to "reveal."

On the night of the declaration of war with Japan, Kouropatkine brought
to Peterhof the French medium Jules Verrier, who received a handsome fee
for pretending to get into touch with the spirit of Peter the Great, who
declared that Russia, in declaring war, had carried out his wishes. And
Nicholas was at once in high glee, and mightily enthusiastic to know that
his historic ancestor approved of his action.

The Imperial Court was full of frauds, traitors, and sycophants. In all
of them Nicholas had the fullest confidence, while his wife was possessed
of certain knowledge which sometimes caused her to discriminate.

The commonplace-looking man in tweeds, who was the entire reverse of
one's idea of an Emperor, grew confidential, and it was plain that he was
quite as much impressed by Grichka as the Empress had been, for
throughout the audience the monk had used to the full his inexplicable
hypnotic power.

"Our good Theophanus and Helidor favour us with their counsel, but,
Father, thou hast our most complete confidence. I beg of thee to grant
the Empress another interview to-morrow, for she is daily longing for
counsel from thee. I will fix the audience. So, as our friend, please
keep the appointment. But before we part I wish to grant to thee any
request that thou mayest desire--any appointment or advancement of any
friend. Speak, and thy wish shall be at once granted."

The monk reflected. It was, indeed, the moment of his first triumph.

"I have a young and extremely able friend named Protopopoff in the
Ministry of the Interior," he replied. "He is a loyal son of Russia, and
a pious believer. Cannot he be advanced?"

"He shall be. I will make a note of the name," and turning to his desk,
he scribbled it upon the blotting-pad with a stubby pencil, repeating the
words:

"Protopopoff--in the Ministry of the Interior."

And such was the manner in which the man who was the most audacious spy
that Germany employed in Russia was placed in the path of advancement,
subsequently in 1915 becoming Minister in his own Department, and
betraying his country for German gold.

Truly, the Potsdam plot was rapidly maturing, and its amazing
ramifications I intend to disclose.




CHAPTER IV

THE MURDER OF STOLYPIN


WITHIN a fortnight of the mock monk's audience of the Tsar he found
himself installed in a fine suite of rooms in the Palace at
Tsarskoe-Selo, one apartment being assigned to myself as his secretary.

Rasputin's ascendancy over the Imperial couple became daily more marked.
I was the onlooker of a very curious and clever game. Spiritualistic
séances were held frequently, at which the Emperor and Empress assisted.
In Petrograd the monk also continued the weekly receptions of his
"disciples," chief among them being Madame Golovine and the Princess
Paley. The Empress fell more and more beneath the evil influence of the
Starets, for she felt convinced that his prayer had been answered by the
birth of an heir.

To one man--even though of the Germanophile party--the intrusion of
Rasputin into the Court circle caused great annoyance. That was Count
Fredericks.

Madame Vyrubova one day told me that the count had that afternoon, in her
presence, inquired of the Emperor:

"Who is this new Starets of whom everybody is talking?"

"Oh! merely a simple mujik whose prayers carry right to Heaven," was His
Majesty's answer. "He is endowed with most sublime faith."

The count then warned the Tsar of the displeasure which Rasputin's
presence at Court was creating on every hand, adding:

"There are rumours that he is a mere drunken libertine. Make inquiries
for yourself of his doings in Petrograd."

"Well, my dear Count," laughed the Emperor carelessly, "better one
Starets than ten hysterics."

This seemed to me to prove that Rasputin's presence often saved the
Emperor from the hysterical outbursts of his wife.

Indeed, only the previous day the monk put about a story in Petrograd to
account for the Empress's hysterical state. He started a rumour that Her
Majesty was, against the advice of the Court physicians, following a
system of German _Entfettungscur_, or cure for obesity, the result having
been a complete breakdown of the nervous system.

Thus, by slow degrees, the artful monk ingratiated himself with the
Imperial family, just as years ago, when a mere cabdriver, in his
pre-saintly days, he happened to ingratiate himself with Alexis, Bishop
of Kazan, who became greatly struck with him, and later pushed him
forward as a holy man, yet for his trouble afterwards found himself swept
away, and his successor appointed by Rasputin's own hand. The monk was
relentless, overbearing, suspicious of any persons who did him a favour,
and at the same time ready to lick the boots of Germany's War Lord.

The "Dark Forces" were now strenuously at work. Little did I enjoy the
quiet of my own rooms in Petrograd. My "saintly" master was ever active
holding conferences, often hourly, with Ministers of State, councillors,
and the "disciples" of his own secret cult.

Very soon I noted that his closest friend was Stolypin, a good-looking
man with beard and curled moustache, who was President of the Council of
Ministers.

At that period Stolypin and the Emperor were inseparable. His Majesty
gave him daily audiences, and sometimes, through Mademoiselle Zéneide
Kamensky, the Empress's chief confidante, he had audience of Her
Majesty.

I met Stolypin often. His Excellency was a bluff but elegant bureaucrat,
who had succeeded Count Witte, a man of refinement, belonging to a very
old boyar family. He was an excellent talker, and with his soft, engaging
manners he could, when he wished, exercise a personal charm that always
had a great effect upon his hearers. His Excellency's great virtue in the
Emperor's eyes was that he never wearied him, and that was much in his
favour; he always curtailed his business. Whatever he had to report to
the Emperor was done quickly, without unnecessary comment, and the
conference ended, they smoked together on terms of almost equality.

I beg the reader's pardon if I here digress for a moment. After Stolypin
we had a well-meaning statesman as Prime Minister in Kokovtsov, who
endeavoured to follow the same lines as his master. He was a talented and
eloquent man, whom I often met, and who at first impressed the Tsar by
his crystallised reports. But Emperor and Prime Minister had no personal
attraction towards each other, as they should have if an empire is to
progress. Nicholas never gave him his confidence.

Perhaps I may be permitted to reveal here a scene historic in the history
of the Empire, being present with my master Rasputin in the Tsar's
private cabinet. It was a very curious incident, and revealed much
concerning the attitude of Nicholas towards the nation.

Kokovtsov, who had allowed Akimoff to be present--the latter, I believe,
in eager anticipation of a triumph--read to the Emperor his new project
for enlarging the Government monopoly system for the sale of vodka. This
would have greatly increased the Government's exchequer, but would
inevitably have ruined the people.

In the room Rasputin sat in his black robe and his big jewelled cross
suspended by its chain, while I stood beside him.

The Emperor, with a cigarette in his mouth, sat in a big arm-chair at his
desk, tracing circles and squares upon a sheet of paper, his habit when
distracted. Now and then he scratched his head. He was attentive to the
report, still drawing his circles, but making no comment, except that his
lips relaxed in a faint smile.

Suddenly he turned to Rasputin and asked: "Well Father, what do you
understand in all this?"

Kokovtsov ceased reading his project, and stood in wonder. Not a single
item of the project had been criticised, no comment had been offered,
therefore His Excellency naturally believed that his efforts were
receiving approbation. Rasputin was silent.

Suddenly the Tsar rose from his chair with a sigh of weariness, and
slowly selected a fresh cigarette from the big golden box upon his
writing-table. Then he shook hands with Kokovtsov as a sign that the
audience was at an end, and said:

"Really, my dear Excellency, I do not agree with your project at all. It
is all utter rubbish, and will only lead the Empire into further
difficulties. Surely Russia has sufficient alcohol!"

I watched the scene with wide-open eyes.

Poor Kokovtsov, so well meaning, bowed in assent and crumpled up before
the Tsar of all the Russias. The blow was quite unexpected. When I left
the Emperor's presence with Rasputin, the latter said:

"Well, my dear Féodor. The day of Kokovtsov is ended. One may be thankful
for it, because it will mean less friction between the Emperor and the
Empress."

Three days later His Majesty dismissed his Prime Minister, but gave him
the title of Count. He had no son, therefore the distinction was a mere
empty one.

With this digression, for which I hope I may be pardoned, I will return
to Stolypin. The mystery of his assassination has always been carefully
hushed-up by the Secret Police, but I here intend to lift the veil, and,
at the risk of producing certain damning evidence, disclose the whole of
the amazing and dastardly plot.

Few people know of it. Rasputin knew it, I know it, the Empress knows it,
and a certain woman living in seclusion in London to-day knows it. But
to the world the truth which I here write will, I venture to believe,
come as a great surprise.

The cry "Land and Liberty" was being heard on every hand in the Empire.
Peter Arkadievitch Stolypin, son of an aide-de-camp general of Alexander
II., was in the zenith of his popularity. He had become a _vermentchik_,
the traditional appellation applied to the favourite of the Emperor, and
as such he loomed largely in the eyes of Europe. He had entered the
public service as a youth, and had later on become governor of the
province of Samara, where he had attracted the notice of Count Witte
because of the drastic way in which he had suppressed some serious riots
there. In due course he was called to Petrograd, where he was introduced
to the Emperor, and later on the mantle of Count Witte had fallen upon
him.

Though in high favour with the Emperor he was clever enough to court the
good graces of Rasputin, knowing full well what supreme influence he
wielded over the Imperial couple. For that reason I frequently had
conversation with him both at Court and at the Poltavskaya. He was a man
of complex nature. A lady-killer of the most elegant type, refined and
determined, yet lurking in the corners of his nature was a tyrannical
trait and a hardness of heart.

In Samara he had distinguished himself by various injustices to the
population, and hundreds of innocent persons had, because they had been
denounced by the _agents-provocateurs_ of the secret police, been sent to
prison or to Siberia by administrative order. At first there was a
rivalry between him and General Trepoff in the Tsar's good graces, but
Trepoff died, leaving Stolypin master of the situation.

Though Rasputin behaved graciously towards him and often dined at his
table, he was in secret his enemy. So cleverly did the monk form and
carry out his plot that to the last he never believed but that the holy
man, who prayed so fervently for his success in the guidance of Russia,
was his most devoted friend.

Many crimes have been committed in Russia beneath the shadow of the Black
Wings, but perhaps none more ingenious than the one under notice.

The first I knew of the deep conspiracy was in the spring of 1911, by the
visit one night to Rasputin's house in the Poltavskaya of a tall,
fair-haired man named Hardt, whom I knew as a frequent visitor to the
monk. He was a merchant in Petrograd and a man of considerable means,
but, as I afterwards discovered, was an agent of Potsdam specially sent
to Russia as the secret factotum of the Tsaritza. He was ever at her beck
and call, and was the instrument by which she exchanged confidential
correspondence with the Kaiser and other persons in Germany.

On that evening when Hardt called quite half-a-dozen of the
sister-disciples were taking tea with the saint and gossiping, for each
Thursday he would hold informal receptions, and with horrible blasphemy
bestow upon the society women who attended his accursed blessing. The
ladies there on that night were all of the most exclusive circle in
Petrograd.

On Hardt's arrival the reception was cut short after he had whispered
some words to the Starets, who made excuse that he had to leave to return
to the palace.

Indeed, he went to the telephone at the farther end of the room and held
a conversation with the Tsaritza's confidante, Mademoiselle Kamensky.
None knew, however, that that private telephone by which the charlatan so
impressed his visitors was merely a fake one, its wires not extending
farther than the end of the garden.

Grichka sometimes when alone rehearsed those conversations, until he
succeeded in producing a perfect series of answers which would strike the
hearer as a most intimate conversation concerning either Emperor or
Empress.

From the chatter upon the mock telephone the assembly concluded that his
presence was required at the palace immediately, therefore they rose and
retired, leaving the mysterious Hardt alone with us.

Instead of going to Tsarskoe-Selo we retired to the saint's little den,
where we opened a bottle of champagne, of which we all three drank.

"Well, my friend Hardt?" asked the monk, flinging himself carelessly into
his easy chair and unbuttoning his long black coat for comfort. "What has
happened? You can, as you know, speak before our faithful Féodor," he
added.

"I have waiting outside a young woman whom I want you to see," replied
the German agent.

"Does she wish to enter our circle?" inquired the monk, adding with his
usual avariciousness: "Has she money?"

"No--neither," was Hardt's reply. "She does not want to become one of
your disciples; indeed, the less you say on that matter the better!"

"Then why should I trouble to see her?"

"I will tell you all after you have chatted with her. May Féodor invite
her in? She is sitting in a droshky outside."

"If you wish," growled Rasputin. "But why all this mystery? I have much
to do. I am due at Countess Ignatieff's--and am already late."

"Remain patient, I beg of you, Father," urged the German suavely. "I am
acting upon instructions--from Number Seventy."

"From Number Seventy!" echoed the monk, instantly realising that Hardt,
an agent of the German Secret Service, was carrying out some
well-concealed and ingenious project. "Very well," he said. "I rely upon
you not to delay me longer than necessary. Féodor," he added, turning to
me with that lofty air which his low mujik mind sometimes conceived to be
superiority, "go and find this mysterious young person."

A few minutes later I conducted into the saint's presence a dark-haired,
extremely handsome young woman of about thirty, who spoke with
considerable refinement and whose arrival mystified me greatly.

Hardt introduced her to the holy man, saying:

"This is Mademoiselle Vera Baltz, of Stavropol, a friend of His
Excellency Peter Stolypin."

"Ah! Welcome, my dear mademoiselle," exclaimed the monk affably. "So you
are a friend of His Excellency--when he was Governor of Samara, I
suppose?"

"Yes. I have come here because I crave your assistance. Monsieur Hardt
knows all the circumstances, and will explain."

The saint turned to the fair-haired man seated opposite him, Mademoiselle
Baltz having been given an easy-chair close by Rasputin's table. It was a
writing-table, but the scoundrel never wrote. Sometimes he pretended to
do so, but the truth was that it was a long and painful procedure with
him. He preferred to scrawl his initials to any typewritten letter which
I prepared.

"The explanation is briefly this, Father," said Hardt in his businesslike
way. "Mademoiselle has been the dupe of His Excellency, who, while
Governor, often went to Stavropol, where he stayed at an hotel under
another name. Mademoiselle never knew his identity until a year ago, when
she saw his photograph in the papers as Prime Minister. She never knew
that he was married--though I have here a letter in which he proposes
marriage to her."

And he produced from his pocket a note, bearing the heading of the
Centralnaya Hotel at Samara, which Rasputin read through.

"Well?" asked the Starets, blowing a cloud of cigarette smoke from his
bearded lips.

"Mademoiselle is anxious to meet His Excellency."

"Ah! I see," exclaimed the monk, whose mind at once turned to blackmail,
a course which he himself was actively pursuing. "Mademoiselle wishes for
money--eh?"

"No, Father," replied the young woman stoutly. "Not money--only justice!
Peter Stolypin misled me, as you see according to his letter. I am but
one of his many victims, and I desire to expose him."

"H'm!" grunted Rasputin, who, having ascertained that no monetary
consideration was forthcoming, was not particularly interested in the
affair. He never did anything without reward. Those who could pay him
well obtained through his influence at Court high office and big
emoluments. Within my own knowledge in at least twenty cases he was
already receiving heavy percentages upon the salaries, including those of
two bishops and three under-secretaries, who had been dug out from
nowhere and pitchforked into office by him.

By his influence with Nicholas the rascal ruled Russia with a relentless
recklessness unparalleled in all history.

"Mademoiselle has already had audience of Her Majesty, who has sent her
here to interview you," Hardt explained. "I am placing her case in the
hands of our friend Altschiller."

The latter was a well-known lawyer, who, by the way, was afterwards
proved to be a spy of Austria.

"What do you desire of me, my dear young lady?" asked Rasputin in the
paternal manner he so often assumed towards the fair sex who hung about
the hem of his ragged robe, and knelt so constantly before him for his
blessing.

"You, Father, are all-powerful in Russia," replied Vera Baltz. "Her
Majesty told me that you would help me to--to destroy Stolypin," she said
with a fierce expression in her black eyes.

Rasputin exchanged glances with the secret agent of Potsdam who, I knew,
did so much dirty work on the Empress's behalf.

"What Her Majesty desires, I am here to obey," was the monk's quiet
response. "I pray that no injustice be done," the blasphemer added,
piously crossing himself.

"Injustice!" cried the girl angrily. "He deceived me, and left me to
starve when he received his advancement and came here to Petrograd. He
became the Tsar's favourite because of his cruel and harsh treatment of
our poor people of Samara, and has climbed to office over the bodies of
those shot down in the streets at his orders. Injustice! There is
assuredly no injustice to drag the ghastly truth concerning him into the
light of day."

"Not at all! I quite agree," said Rasputin, rising and shaking her hand.
"You can tell your lawyer from me that you have my assistance, but in
strictest secrecy, of course. Not a soul must know of it, remember!" he
added, looking straight at her with that strange hypnotic glance of his,
a gaze beneath which she quivered visibly.

"I shall remain silent," she promised.

"If the truth leaks out that you have seen either Her Majesty or myself,
then I shall instantly become your enemy, and not your friend," the monk
declared.

"Only Monsieur Hardt knows," the girl said. "It was he who took me to
Peterhof."

"You may rely upon the silence of both my friends," Rasputin assured her,
and a moment later I conducted her downstairs and out into the street.

When I returned to where Rasputin was still seated with his visitor, the
latter was, I found, making explanation how he had, after considerable
difficulty, traced the woman Baltz at the Empress's orders and taken her
to the Palace, first, however, prompting her to seek revenge upon the
Prime Minister.

"I cannot understand it at all," Hardt added.

"I do. Cannot you see that Stolypin is violently anti-German and openly
disapproves of the Germanophile party at Court?"

"But he is closeted daily with the Emperor, I understand. And the Empress
grants him frequent audiences."

"Because she is endeavouring to ascertain the true extent of His
Excellency's knowledge of her own dealings with our friends in Berlin,"
was the monk's reply. "Alix pretends to be most gracious to him, yet she
is distinctly antagonistic, more from fear than anything else. To-day he
is a favourite at Court, to-morrow----"

And Grichka made a wide sweep with his dirty knotted hand without
concluding his sentence.

"Has Her Majesty spoken to you concerning her fears that Stolypin has
discovered something?" asked the man Hardt eagerly.

The monk grinned meaningly.

"Her Majesty is taking precautions," he replied evasively. "Possibly
Stolypin has discovered the reason you travelled to Berlin a month ago. I
have an idea that you were watched by the Okhrana."

"Do you really think so?" gasped the German in quick apprehension. "Why
do you suspect?"

"From something whispered to me a week ago."

"Then Stolypin may know that Alexandra Feodorovna is behind the
traitorous dealings of Colonel Miassoyedeff on the frontier--eh?"

Rasputin, his eyes fixed upon his visitor, slowly nodded in the
affirmative.

"That means ruin--perhaps imprisonment for me!" Hardt gasped, his face
pale and anxious.

"I might say the same thing," remarked the saint, stroking his long,
untrimmed beard. "But I do not. We are both strong enough to resist all
attacks. Any suspicion against Miassoyedeff must be removed. I will see
that the Emperor promotes him to-morrow. Our one stumbling-block is Peter
Stolypin."

"One that, I take it, must be removed?"

"Yes--at all costs. That is why the Empress has sought out this woman
Baltz, who, if my estimate of her sex is correct, is a wild firebrand."

"She certainly is viciously vindictive."

"One thing is certain, our friend Stolypin has no idea that he is seated
on the edge of a volcano," remarked the monk. "He lives extremely happily
with his wife and children in that beautiful villa over on the Islands of
the Apothecaries, and has no suspicion of the coming storm. I promised
his wife to go to her salon to-morrow night."

"And will you go?"

"Of course. There must be no suspicion. Are we not, all of us, his best
friends?" asked the monk, grinning evilly.

"I am returning to Berlin by way of Stockholm on Thursday," Hardt said,
for he gave as the reason for his frequent visits to Germany and
Scandinavia that he bought leather in those countries. "Have you anything
to report?"

"Yes. One or two things," replied the Starets, who ordered me to write at
his dictation as follows:

     "MEMORANDUM.

     "FROM GREGORY TO NUMBER SEVENTY.

     "Have acted upon your instructions regarding the Kahovsky affair.
     Some important correspondence was seized by the police at his
     arrest, and for two days matters looked extremely unpromising. I
     paid T. twenty thousand roubles to close his lips, and induced
     the Emperor to release Kahovsky and restore his papers. I suggest
     that he should be recalled from Russia and sent to London, where,
     being unknown, he might be extremely useful to you.

     "Madame Zlobine is at the Adlon Hotel in your city. She has
     quarrelled with the General, and strict watch should be kept upon
     her. She has been heard to express very decided views against Her
     Majesty. It may be found that she is in communication with J. If
     so, it is in the interests of Stolypin's anti-German campaign!

     "Hardt will explain verbally the position of the latter, and the
     discovery of the woman Baltz. Meanwhile His Excellency is
     unsuspicious that we are aware of his hostile intentions towards
     us.

     "Please do me the favour to assure His Majesty the Emperor of my
     continued efforts in the service of Alexandra Feodorovna, even
     though matters are daily growing more complicated. Anna [Madame
     Vyrubova], moreover, is more difficult to please.

     "Both Stürmer and Protopopoff are under my protection, and I have
     already contrived to advance them. Kokovtsov is growing in favour
     and will be a force to be reckoned with in the immediate future.
     Urge Miassoyedeff, from your side, to exercise the greatest
     caution. There are whispers, but I have endeavoured to stifle
     them by contriving his advancement through the Emperor, who
     yesterday decorated him.

     "The Imperial pair will shortly visit the Danish and Swedish
     Courts, and probably go for a cruise in Norwegian waters, though
     there is, as yet, no announcement.

     "I am still working upon the project you set out when we met in
     Helsingfors two months ago regarding the reduction and weakening
     of the army. I have already initiated the matter through ladies
     whose husbands are in the Ministry of War. It will mean the
     expenditure of a considerable sum of your money, but I know it
     will be a mere bagatelle if your object is accomplished.

     "I have to acknowledge a payment of one hundred thousand roubles
     into the Azof Bank from an unknown source. Please remember that
     S. in Paris and J. in Rome are making big claims upon me, and
     that next month I must receive a similar sum.

     "Hardt has told me that matters are progressing well at Carlton
     House Terrace, and also in Paris. Of that I am glad to hear. Let
     our next meeting be at the Phoenix Hotel in Abo, where I am
     unknown, and which you can reach without notice. At present I
     dare not leave Russia, as Her Majesty will not hear of it.

     "It would be as well to make the next payment through the
     Aktiebank in Abo. They would not suspect.

     "Do not fail to impress upon both Sukhomlinoff and Miassoyedeff
     the necessity for the utmost caution. Till we meet."

When I had typed this at his dictation I handed it to him, and he managed
painfully to append his illiterate signature.

Then I placed the sheets in an envelope and gave them to Hardt to convey
in secret to the headquarters of the German Secret Service in the
Königgrätzerstrasse in Berlin.

"And, friend Hardt," Rasputin said, as the Kaiser's emissary placed the
letter carefully in his wallet, "please impress upon Number Seventy what
I have said about money. All this costs much. Tell him that sometimes
when inordinate demands are made upon me--as you know they are often
are--I have to use my own funds in order to satisfy them. Smith in London
receives unlimited funds through the Deutsche Bank, I know, so please
tell our friend from me that I expect similar treatment in future."

The Starets was one of the most far-seeing and mercenary scoundrels. He
had accounts in different names in half-a-dozen banks in Petrograd and
Moscow, into which he constantly made payments as the result of his
widespread campaign of espionage and the blackmailing of silly women who
fell beneath his uncanny spell.

When Hardt had left, the saint opened another bottle of champagne and
drank it all from a tumbler, afterwards consuming half a bottle of
brandy. I was busy with three days' accumulation of letters, and did not
notice it until, an hour later, I found him dead asleep on the floor of
the dining-room--a pretty spectacle if presented to the millions of our
patriotic Russians who believed in the Tsar as their "Father" and in the
divinity of the "holy man" who directed the Empire's affairs.

The saint filled me with increasing disgust, yet I confess I had become
fascinated by the widespread and desperate conspiracies which he either
engineered himself or of which he pulled the most important strings.

In the plot against Stolypin, though none dreamed of it, he had been the
most active agent. Stolypin, a purely honest and loyal Russian, who, on
taking office as Prime Minister, was actuated by a firm determination to
do his level best for the Empire, was an unwanted statesman. He was too
honest, and, therefore, dangerous to the Court camarilla set up and paid
by Potsdam.

As the days passed the monk frequently referred to him as a thorn in the
side of the Empress.

"The fellow must be got rid of!" he declared to me more than
once. "He suspects a lot, and he knows too much. He is dangerous to us,
Féodor--very dangerous!"

One night, when we were together in his room at Tsarskoe-Selo, after he
had been dining _en famille_ with the Imperial family, he remarked:

"Things are going well. I saw the lawyer Altschiller to-day. All is
prepared for the coup against Stolypin, who is still ignorant that Vera
Baltz is in Petrograd."

I knew Altschiller, who often called at the Poltavskaya. He was a close
friend of Monsieur Raeff, whom Rasputin, when all-powerful a little later
on, actually appointed as Procurator of the Holy Synod, having placed the
appointment upon the Emperor's desk to sign!

The law case was, however, delayed. Hardt was on one of his frequent
absences--in Germany, no doubt--and matters did not move so rapidly as to
satisfy the Empress. The whole plot was to keep the Prime Minister in the
dark until the moment when the skeleton of his past should be dragged
from its cupboard.

As announced by Rasputin, the Emperor and Empress had visited Denmark and
Norway on board the _Standart_, and were back again at Peterhof, when one
day Rasputin received his friend Boris Stürmer, the bureaucrat, at that
time struggling strenuously for advancement. In the monk's den Stürmer,
chatting about Stolypin and the vindictive woman who had come to
Petrograd to destroy him--for he was one of the paid servants of Potsdam,
and in consequence knew most of the secrets--said:

"Have you, Father, ever met a Jew named Bagrov?"

"Never to my knowledge. Why?"

"Because I know from my friend Venikoff, one of the assistant-directors
of Secret Police, that the man, a discharged _agent-provocateur_ and
incensed at the way he has been treated by Stolypin, has joined forces
with some mysterious young woman named Baltz. There is a whisper that
between them they are engineering a plot to assassinate the Prime
Minister!"

Rasputin's strange eyes met mine. Both of us knew more than this
struggling sycophant.

"Bagrov?" the saint repeated. "Who is he?"

"Oh! A fellow who was assistant to Azeff in some disgraceful matters in
Warsaw--an _agent-provocateur_ who lived afterwards for some time in
Paris and on the Riviera. He attributes his downfall to Stolypin, and
hence is most bitter against him. He has, I hear, fallen in love with the
woman Baltz, who hails from Samara."

"Well?" asked the saint.

"Well?--nothing," laughed the man with the goat-beard. "I simply tell you
what I know. There is a plot--that is all! And as far as I can discern
the swifter Stolypin leaves the Court, the easier it will be for Her
Majesty and ourselves--eh? While Stolypin is daily with the Emperor there
is hourly danger for us."

"In that I certainly agree," declared Rasputin. "We must be
watchful--very watchful."

We remained alert--all of us. That same night Rasputin informed the
Empress of the secret plot of the black-haired Vera and her lover
Bagrov.

The Court left for the Crimea next day, and Rasputin travelled with the
Imperial family. Stolypin, in ignorance of what was in progress, was of
the party, I being left in Petrograd to follow three days later.

On arrival at Kiev, where the Emperor had arranged to review the troops,
a gala performance was held in the theatre that night. Opposite the
Imperial box sat Stolypin, with two other high officials of the Court,
when, during the entr'acte, a man dashed in, and in full view of the
Emperor and Empress fired a revolver at the Prime Minister.

The confusion this caused was terrible. Her Majesty fainted and was
dragged out of the box by Mademoiselle Kamensky, while the Tsar swiftly
jumped to his feet and regarded the scene calmly.

"I'm done!" gasped the patriotic and honest Stolypin, as those present
seized the assassin, who was none other than the ex-_agent-provocateur_
Bagrov.

Six hours later the Prime Minister breathed his last, a victim of the
Empress and her Potsdam camarilla, while Vera Baltz fled to Switzerland.

Rasputin afterwards told me that he urged the Court to leave Kiev at
once, adding:

"It was far best for Alix and Nicholas to pretend horror of the tragedy
than to offer condolences."

And so ended another chapter of Russia's underground history.




CHAPTER V

THE POWER BEHIND THE THRONE


THE murder of Stolypin, though unsuspected by the chancelleries of
Europe, was, as I have explained, the work of the Hidden Hand of Germany.
Stolypin had suspected the true state of affairs at the Russian Court,
therefore the success of Germany in the coming war depended upon closing
his mouth; so Potsdam, using the erotic monk Rasputin as its catspaw,
effected a coup which had, alas! sad result to Holy Russia.

Stolypin was but one of many persons of both sexes who, because they knew
too much of Germany's secret propaganda in Russia, fell victims in those
constant conspiracies whereby they were swept either into the net of the
corrupt police or into their graves.

As servant of the head of Russia's "Dark Forces"--as Rasputin and
Protopopoff were afterwards denounced in the Duma--I was compelled to be
ever at the saint's elbow; hence I saw and heard much that was
astounding.

One night, a few months after Stolypin's assassination, we had been
bidden to dinner by the great Polish landowner Ivan Volkhovski, who had a
beautiful villa outside Petrograd. There I met a smart, middle-aged
Russian officer, who, over our champagne, declared to me that things were
growing critical in Europe over the Balkan question, but that France and
Russia were united against any attack that Germany might secretly
engineer.

"Then you think that war is really coming?" I asked him in surprise.

"Think!" he echoed. "You are a cosmopolitan, surely! Don't you know? Are
you really blind?"

"Well, I am blind politically," I replied with a wink. "I see that on all
sides people are getting rich quickly and receiving ironmongery--as I
call the tin decorations from the Sovereign--as reward for closing their
eyes to the true facts."

"Ah! I see that you are quite wideawake, my dear Rajevski," said the
officer, whose name was Colonel Dubassoff. "Our friends here in Petrograd
will continue to remain asleep, for they have every incentive, thanks to
the great pro-German propaganda and the generous distribution of German
gold. To-day our enemies in Berlin have their hands outstretched and
clutching upon Paris, New York, Rome and London, just as they have here
in Petrograd. War must come--depend upon it. The English Lord Roberts has
forecast it. He knows!"

"Then you believe that Germany is at work actively arming in preparation
for war?"

"Most certainly I do," replied the colonel. "Only a month ago I was in
London and afterwards in Paris. In London the authorities are not so
entirely asleep as we are in Russia."

Suddenly, as he spoke, I noticed that Rasputin, who was in whispered
conversation with Bishop Theophanus, a fellow-guest, had been listening
very attentively.

Two hours later, when I returned home with Rasputin, he ordered me to sit
down and write a note, which the scoundrel dictated as follows:

     "Please listen to N.N. Colonel Paul Dubassoff, of the
     Préobrajensky Regiment, has expressed in my presence to-night
     disloyalty to the Sovereign, and he is a serious danger to the
     State. He should be suppressed."

To this lie the monk scrawled his initials, and next morning the letter
was sent to the Chief of the Secret Police. Within twelve hours the
unfortunate colonel who had dared to pronounce his opinion concerning
Germany's activities was already lodged in the fortress of Peter and
Paul, where, I believe, he remained until the Revolution of 1917.

At that moment, however, the German propaganda in Russia found itself in
an extremely critical state. By Stolypin's murder a new difficulty had
arisen. All the colleagues of the late Prime Minister believed themselves
entitled to become his successor, and as each had his own particular
circle of friends, each naturally pulled all the political wires
possible. Intrigues arose on every hand, and though everybody realised
the personal danger of anybody appointed to the dead man's position, yet
ambition was apparent everywhere.

The Empress, who had now returned from her fateful journey to the Crimea,
was in daily consultation with the monk, it being their intention to
obtain the appointment of some hard-up Minister who, by being well paid
with German gold, would remain inert and keep his mouth closed regarding
the world-plot in progress. Being at Tsarskoe-Selo, and conducting the
Starets's correspondence, I know how deep was the intrigue to keep out
and discredit the Minister of Finance, Vladimir Nicholaievitch Kokovtsov,
who was known to be the only strong man who could succeed Stolypin.

The whole machinery of the pro-German propaganda had been set to work
from Berlin to prevent the mantle of Stolypin falling upon Kokovtsov. Yet
one afternoon, while I sat writing at Rasputin's dictation in his elegant
sitting-room in the palace of Tsarskoe-Selo, the Empress, who was dressed
ready to go for her daily drive, burst angrily in, saying:

"Nikki has just appointed that hateful money-grubber Kokovtsov! I tried
all I could to prevent it, Father. But I have failed!"

Rasputin smiled at her words, and with that sinister calmness that
characterised him in moments of chagrin, he replied:

"Pray do not distress thyself, O lady! Kokovtsov will assuredly not be
long in office when the hand of Gregory is lifted against him."

"He must not remain long. He may get to know too much, as others have
done. In Berlin his appointment will give the greatest offence," she
said.

"I will ask the Almighty's intercession, for I see, O lady, that thou art
nervous and unstrung. Compose thyself, I beg of thee. All will be well,"
and the "healer" crossed himself piously.

Truly, the condition of our dear land was in parlous state. A vogue for
asceticism had sprung up, just as other vogues have become popular in
other European countries.

As head of this circle of ascetic followers the monk had, with the
connivance of Badmayev the herbalist, invented an expedient to deaden the
flesh so as to render it benumbed as with cocaine. Hundreds of
weak-minded women were flocking about him. Some of them were wives and
daughters of the wealthy manufacturing class, but most were of the high
aristocracy, who all regarded my employer as the Saviour of Russia, sent
by Heaven to reform and deliver the "Holy" land from the toils of unrest
and desolation.

We Russians are always idealists. That is our curse. Our religion is,
unfortunately, an obsession, for any drunken scoundrel can become a "holy
man" by simply making such declaration, and ever afterwards "sponging"
upon his neighbours. Rasputin was but an example of this.

After all, it was but natural that, with the bevy of female devotees ever
at his knees, he should attract the gossip of the scandalmongers. Much,
indeed, of what they said was true, for I happen to know that personally.

But on that day at Tsarskoe-Selo I noted the Empress's agitation that
Kokovtsov had been appointed, and began to suspect that the camarilla
would take drastic action in order to defeat him. Indeed, when the
Empress had left the room, Rasputin grew thoughtful in turn, and stroked
his unkempt beard as he paced the floor, saying:

"Ah, Féodor! We must crush this jackanapes. I must see what we can do."

Weeks went by. The usual meetings of the monk's "sister-disciples" were
held at the house in the Poltavskaya, and often in the presence of a
stranger or a female novice about to be admitted to the cult he pretended
to speak to Alexandra Feodorovna over his mock telephone.

Every action of the monk was that of an arrogant and erotic swindler. His
intelligence was, however, extremely perceptive, and he was not wanting
in finesse of the mujik order, combined with a sense of foresight that
was utterly amazing. These, with his suave manner, his affectation of
deepest piety, and his wonderful fascination over women of every age and
every class, had now brought him to the position of the power behind the
Throne.

He already ruled Russia. Tsar and Tsaritza were his puppets, so cleverly
did he play his cards, yet as he frequently remarked to me in the weeks
that followed:

"Kokovtsov is against me. We are enemies. He must go."

I knew that if the Premier had an enemy in Grichka, then the statesman
was doomed.

Now, the plot which Rasputin formed against the new Prime Minister was an
extremely clever and subtle one.

While it was being carried out I often met Vladimir Nicholaievitch, who
was naturally compelled to curry favour with the Father, and consequently
sometimes visited him even against his inclination, no doubt. He was a
long, rather narrow-faced, bearded man, with a pair of deep-set eyes and
a secretive air, subtle by temperament, and keenly alive to his own
interests as well as those of the Empire.

His one sin in the eyes of Alexandra Feodorovna was that he hated
Germany.

"He once lost money in a German financial concern," Rasputin declared to
me one day with a laugh. "That is why he cannot bear the Germans."

The Premier, risen from the middle-class, was a dandy who never looked
one in the face, and whose eyes were ever upon his own clothes, as though
expecting to find specks of dust upon them. He was always immaculately
dressed, and his newly-acquired manners were so perfect that I often
wondered if he carried a book of etiquette in his pocket.

My own estimate of him was that he was too neat, too well groomed, too
civil, too bowing, and too anxious not to forget what he should say at
the right moment. In a word, he was an elegant who had suddenly entered
the Court entourage, in which there was no place for him.

The Tsar had no affection for him, and had merely appointed him because
he believed that he might worry him less than others whose names and
abilities had been put forward.

Poor Kokovtsov! He was in complete ignorance of the clever plot which
Rasputin, at the Empress's suggestion, was engineering against his
patriotic activities. Germany intended to rule Russia in the near
future, and woe betide any statesman who would not remain inert and be
spoon-fed by Teutonic propaganda, or place in his pocket the German marks
held out so temptingly to him. In that way lay advancement, emoluments,
decorations, and the Tsar's favour. To be Russian was, alas! to court
disaster and ignominy.

Monsieur Kokovtsov was typically a good Russian. He had no fighting
spirit, but was essentially a man of peace, entertaining a horror of
bloodshed or of sanguinary deeds. His placid temper caused him to avoid
all questions in dispute. He was prepared to do all possible to benefit
our country. He had cleverly conducted the election campaign, and had all
the governors of each province with him. The Emperor trusted him; the
Empress hated him.

Besides, Kokovtsov was a worker. He did not believe in that favourite
expression among Russians, "_nechevo_," which really means "nothing," but
is equivalent to "don't bother" or "don't worry." In Russia we
unfortunately always have a "_zarftra_," or to-morrow. For that reason he
was disliked also by the people.

It was not many months after his appointment when one night, at the
Poltavskaya, Rasputin received a visit from General Rogogin, the Director
of the Black Cabinet, the _cabinet noir_, the existence of which was
rigorously kept secret until the Revolution afforded the public a glimpse
of Russia behind the scenes.

Even from the tribune of the Duma it was declared that the Black Cabinet
was a fiction. Yet I happened to know that it existed, for later that
evening I accompanied Rasputin and the Director to the General Post
Office, where in three rooms on the second floor of the building the
mysterious department, where correspondence was opened and read, was
situated. Here was the most secret establishment of the Imperial Police.
For over a hundred years had this mysterious department been at work
examining the letters of all classes of people whose thoughts or doings
could be of interest to the Tsar, his Minister of the Interior, or the
Okhrana. Indeed, I learned from the general's conversation with the
monk--I first having taken an oath never to divulge anything of what I
saw or heard--that even the correspondence of the Tsar, his relatives, or
friends was not immune from examination.

Then I instantly realised the reason that the Tsaritza and Rasputin, in
communicating with their friends in Germany, sent their letters by hand.

On the night in question I stood watching with interest how letters for
secret examination were taken from a lift which passed up and down from
the sorting-rooms above to the distributing room below. The basket was
taken off the lift during its slow descent, and another basket
substituted containing letters already examined, so quickly that the man
in charge of the lift below noticed nothing.

We saw several processes of opening letters by steaming them, first
taking an impression in plaster of any seal, and also by cutting off the
end of the envelope by means of a small guillotine. The letters were
dexterously opened, photographed, replaced in their respective envelopes,
refastened and new seals made, or in other cases the ends of the cut
envelopes were resealed by means of paper pulp to match the colour of the
envelope, and placed under pressure in a hot press, thus actually
remaking the paper!

The watchman of this secret chamber was an illiterate, deaf and dumb
peasant.

"Each functionary on being first admitted here," said Rogogin, "is
compelled to take a solemn oath never to divulge its existence to a
living soul--not to his wife, father, sister, brother, or dearest
friend."

All was remarkable, a spying system of which I had never dreamed.

When we entered the Director's well-furnished private room and the door
was closed, Rogogin took from a locker drawer a letter which he handed to
the monk, saying:

"Here is the letter of which I spoke; if I hold it back it may arouse
suspicion."

Rasputin, who could only read with difficulty, looked at the letter, and
then, handing it to me with that lofty air he assumed in the belief that
he could conceal his ignorance, said:

"Féodor, read it to me."

It was on grey paper, and was as follows:

                                "IMPERIAL RUSSIAN EMBASSY,
                                        "UNTER DEN LINDEN, 7.
                                             "June 8th.
     "_Secret._

     "YOUR EXCELLENCY,--In accordance with your instructions I beg to
     report confidentially as follows: On arrival here I presented my
     credentials of His Excellency our Ambassador, and in consequence
     was allowed to conduct a confidential inquiry among the staff of
     the Embassy, and in other quarters, in which I have been actively
     assisted with excellent results by P. Ostrovski, agent of the
     Okhrana in Berlin, whom I recommend for advancement.

     "My discoveries are several, and of an interesting nature. First,
     a person named Hardt, who is often resident in Petrograd, is the
     secret courier of the Empress between Potsdam and Tsarskoe-Selo.
     Secondly, a sum of one hundred thousand marks was paid by the
     Dresdner Bank on March 11th last to the account of one Boris
     Stürmer, who has an account in Riga at the Disconto Gesellschaft.
     Thirdly, the Emperor William on April 2nd gave audience in secret
     at the Berlin Schloss to M. Protopopoff, for which no reason can
     be assigned. Fourthly, I have learned on the best authority that
     if Herr Hardt were arrested on any of his journeys to Sweden or
     Germany, some highly interesting private correspondence would be
     found upon him. Fifthly, there is no doubt whatever that the monk
     Rasputin is in receipt of money from this city, as I have in my
     possession a receipt given by him for two hundred thousand
     roubles paid him by the Deutsche Bank, and this I am bringing
     with me on my return.

     "Further, I have documentary evidence of a widespread German
     intrigue in Russia, facts which will, I feel confident, amaze
     your Excellency. When I return I shall place in your hands
     weapons by which the enemy may be combated. I hesitate to send
     any documents through the post in case they miscarry, and I am
     addressing this letter to Mademoiselle Pauline, as your
     Excellency suggested.

     "I have yet some further inquiries to make on your Excellency's
     behalf, but I intend to leave Berlin in any case on the
     twenty-second. I have the honour to remain, your Excellency's
     obedient servant,                               IVAN BOTKINE."

The monk listened attentively, his big, strange eyes wearing a sly,
crafty expression. He fingered the jewelled cross suspended from his
neck--a habit of his.

"Ah! So Botkine leaves Berlin on the twenty-second. It is well that we
know this, my dear Rogogin--eh?"

"Yes," laughed the traitorous general. "He must not reach Russia."

"Of course not," agreed the monk. "We must obtain possession of this
documentary evidence that he will carry upon him. Who is he?"

"Botkine is a confidential agent in Kokovtsov's employ," was the
Director's reply. "He was, I find, assistant-director of police in Nijni
before the Minister was appointed, and is now in His Excellency's private
service."

"Well, it is excellent that by your astuteness, my dear General, we are
forewarned. If not, there might very easily have resulted a serious
contretemps--eh?"

"Exactly."

"And who is this Mademoiselle Pauline?" asked Rasputin, his clever
criminal brain already at work to defeat a revelation of the truth.

"Pauline Lahure, the little French dancer at the Villa Rode."

"Lahure!" cried Rasputin. "I know her, of course, a music-hall artiste.
She has been lately taken up by the old Countess Bronevski. She was at my
house only a fortnight ago, and wanted to become a 'sister'!"

"As spy of Kokovtsov--eh?"

"Without a doubt," I chimed in. "From all I hear His Excellency is a gay
dog."

"True, my dear Féodor," remarked the monk, fingering the cross nervously,
and then taking a cigarette which the general offered him. "But had not
our friend Rogogin been on the alert and opened the dainty dancer's
letters, what a trap we should have fallen into--not only ourselves, but
the Empress also! Vladimir would have presented the documents to the
Emperor, and an unholy domestic scene would have resulted. This fellow
Botkine must never reach Russia!" he added seriously.

"I agree," replied the general. "Let us see Gutchkoff at once," he added.
General Gutchkoff was a Jew and the director of the dreaded political
police, with whom Rogogin, of course, worked hand-in-glove.

It was then nearly eleven o'clock at night, but we all three drove to
General Gutchkoff's house in the Spaskaya. He was out, his man informed
us.

"I must see him at once," said the monk loftily. "Where is he?"

"He went out to dinner, Holy Father, and he is probably now at the
Krestovsky or at the Bouffes."

"Go at once and find him," said the monk. "It is a matter of extreme
urgency, and we will await him here."

Thus ordered by Gregory Rasputin--who was all-powerful in the
capital--the general's servant ushered us into a cosy little salon,
placed a box of cigarettes and some liqueurs before us, and then himself
left in a droshky to find his master, who was so well known in Petrograd
as a _bon viveur_.

For half an hour Rasputin, much worried by the secret inquiries of the
Premier into the doings of the pro-German camarilla, chatted with the
general, more than once expressing fear regarding the perilous situation.

"Revelations seem imminent," he exclaimed anxiously. "The man Botkine
must never arrive in Russia--you understand that, Rogogin!"

"I quite agree," said the Director of the Black Cabinet. "But Gutchkoff
must see to it. I have done my part in the affair."

"You have done excellently, my dear friend--most excellently," declared
the monk. "Nothing could have been better. I will mention your great
services to the Empress. Yes, we must rely upon Gutchkoff."

In half an hour the servant returned with his master, the head of the
political police, a short, fat man in general's uniform, with
decorations, who, when he entered the room, betrayed unmistakable signs
of having dined well. Indeed, he had been unearthed from a midnight
carouse at a questionable restaurant.

At sight of Rasputin, a power to be reckoned with and a person of whom
even the greatest in the land craved favours, he pulled himself together
and cast himself into a chair to listen.

The monk was clever enough not to enlighten the Police Director regarding
the plot to upset Kokovtsov's undue inquisitiveness. He merely told him
that a certain secret agent named Botkine was leaving Berlin for
Petrograd on the twenty-second.

"The man is dangerous," he added, "extremely dangerous."

"Why?" asked Gutchkoff, somewhat surprised at our midnight visit.

"Because--well, because I happen to know that he is in possession of
certain facts concerning very high personages. He is a blackmailer, and
has been to Berlin to endeavour to sell some documents to Maximilian
Harden--documents which, if published, would place a certain member of
our Imperial family in a very unsatisfactory light," Rasputin said. "My
friend Rogogin here will bear me out."

The Police Director, after a few minutes' silence, asked:

"Has he sold the documents in question?"

"I think not," was Rasputin's reply. "If he has not, he will have them in
his possession on his return. We must secure them at all costs."

"You wish to close his mouth--eh?"

"Yes. He must be suppressed at all hazards," declared the monk. "It is
the wish of the Emperor," he added, a glib lie always ready upon his
tongue. "Further, I need not add that if this affair be conducted in
secrecy and scandal in the Imperial House avoided, His Majesty will
certainly see that you are adequately rewarded. I can promise you that."

General Gutchkoff was again silent. He well knew that if the Tsar had
ordered the man Botkine to be silenced there must be some very unsavoury
affair to be hushed up.

"There is an agent of yours in Berlin named Ostrovski, is there not?" the
monk asked.

"Yes."

"Then he must also be removed at once to another post. Transfer him to
Constantinople, or, better still, to Yokohama. He must not remain in
Berlin another twenty-four hours, and he must, not, at any cost, be
allowed to return to Russia," Rasputin said decisively.

"I scarcely follow you, Holy Father," was the amazed general's reply.
"Ostrovski is very reliable, and has been entrusted with the most
delicate affairs. He has always given me the greatest satisfaction."

"I regret if he is under your protection, but that does not alter
matters. He and Botkine have been acting in unison, and hence Ostrovski
knows more of this scandal concerning a certain member of the Imperial
family than is good for him to know. Promote him with increased salary to
Yokohama, and send him there by way of Marseilles upon some confidential
mission. But on no account must he return to Russia before going to
Japan--you understand? He will no doubt wish to travel by way of Siberia,
but this must be forbidden. If you will write out his appointment, I will
obtain the Emperor's signature to it to-morrow morning."

"You wish me to write out the order now--eh?" asked Gutchkoff, still much
puzzled, but eager to get scent of the particular scandal known to
Botkine.

"Yes, now," replied the monk, pointing to the writing-table, whereupon
the Police Director sat down and wrote out the order transferring the
agent Ostrovski to Japan, an order which Rasputin, after pretending to
read it, handed to me to place in my pocket.

"And now, what about this person Botkine?" asked Gutchkoff. "How do you
wish me to act towards him?"

"In the way that I will direct to-morrow," replied the monk. "I must have
time to devise some plan--a plan which will be secret and arouse no
suspicion," he added grimly, with a sinister smile.

Early next morning I accompanied him to Peterhof, where the Imperial
Court happened to be. Anna Vyrubova was away in Moscow, but without delay
he sought the Empress and remained in her boudoir for a full hour, no
doubt explaining the discovery of Kokovtsov's inquiries in Berlin.

I met the Prime Minister himself in the long corridor guarded by "Araby"
servants which led to the Emperor's private cabinet, and with him was
General Gutchkoff, who had evidently also been summoned to audience
regarding some matters concerning the police administration. Kokovtsov
had no suspicion of what Rasputin had learned, or that Gutchkoff had
promised to act as he directed against his trusted agent Ivan Botkine.

The pair strolled along the softly carpeted corridor, chatting affably,
for they were apparently going to consult His Majesty together. Truly,
the Court world is a strange life of constant intrigue and
double-dealing, of lack of morals and of honesty of purpose and of
patriotism. In our Holy Russia many good men and women have, because of
their love for their own land, been sent to drag out their lives in the
dreariness of the Siberian prison camps.

When the monk returned to me he asked for Ostrovski's appointment,
written on the previous night, which I carried in my pocket. This he took
at once to the Tsar. His Majesty was at that moment closeted with the
Prime Minister, Gutchkoff having already seen the Emperor and,
transacting his business, been dismissed.

Five minutes later Rasputin returned with the Emperor's scribbled
signature still wet, and in my presence handed it to the Director of
Political Police. Ostrovski had been transferred to Japan, where he would
be harmless, even though he might have learned facts from Botkine. But
what had Rasputin decided should be the fate of the latter? For the sake
of Alexandra Feodorovna and the whole camarilla Botkine's lips must, I
knew, be closed. That had been decided. I longed to learn what the
Empress had said when the monk had revealed the truth to her and pointed
out her peril.

No doubt Her Majesty would see to it that the affair was hushed up. I
knew full well that she understood that once Kokovtsov obtained evidence
too many people would be implicated, and perhaps a public trial might
result. Both she and Rasputin, no doubt, realised that it would be unwise
to allow a member of the Okhrana--as Botkine had been--to be arrested,
for fear of the scandal public revelations would cause. The capital
teemed with Germans like Stürmer and Fredericks, traitors like
Protopopoff and Soukhomlinoff, men like Azeff, Guerassimoff and
Kurtz--one day the bosom friend of Ministers and powerful noblemen, and
the next cast into the fortress of Peter and Paul--Rogogin, the sycophant
Raeff--whom Rasputin had made Procurator of the Holy Synod--and the
drunken "saint" Mitia the Blessed--at last dismissed--spiritualists,
charlatans, and cranks. Upon such fine society was the Throne of the
Romanoffs based! Was it any wonder that it was already tottering
preparatory to its fall?

I left Peterhof with Rasputin at about three o'clock that afternoon, and
on our return to the Poltavskaya I spoke over the telephone, at the
monk's orders, to Doctor Badmayev, the expert herbalist who prepared
those secret drugs with which Madame Vyrubova regularly doped the little
Tsarevitch, keeping him in a constant state of ill-health and in such a
condition that he puzzled the most noted physicians in Europe.

Badmayev, a small, ferret-eyed man, his features of Tartar cast, came and
dined with us, after which Rasputin signed a cheque for twenty-eight
thousand roubles, a sum to which "the doctor" was entitled under an
agreement. Well did I know that the sum in question was payment for his
active assistance in supplying certain drugs of which the monk in turn
declared that he himself held the formula. The drugs--which he pretended
to be the secret of the priests of Tibet--were those which he doled out
in small quantities to his sister-disciples, and which produced
insensibility to physical pain, drugs which were so baneful and
pernicious that the monk always warned me against them, and never took
any himself.

After dinner, at which they both drank deeply of champagne, the monk and
his friend went out to spend the evening at a low-class variety theatre,
while I was left alone until midnight.

In consequence I visited some friends in the Ivanovskaya, and returned to
Rasputin's at about a quarter-past twelve. Twenty minutes later he
returned in a hopeless state of intoxication; therefore I did not speak
to him till next morning.

Such was the fellow's vitality that he was up before six o'clock. At
seven he went out, and returned about nine, when he called me to his den.

"Féodor," he said, "I wish you to leave to-day for Vilna, and go to the
Palace Hotel there. Remain until a friend of ours named Heckel calls upon
you."

"Who is Heckel?" I asked, surprised at being sent upon such a long
journey in that sudden manner.

"A friend of Hardt and myself. Do not be inquisitive--only obey. When
Heckel calls please give him this letter," and he handed me a rather
thick letter in an official cartridge envelope of the Imperial Ministry
of Foreign Affairs. "Heckel will tell you that he is from 'Father
Gregory.' He is tall, fair, and rather slim--a German, as you may guess
from his name. Your train leaves at two-forty this afternoon. Be careful
of that letter and to whom you deliver it in secret. Heckel, after
finding you at the hotel, will produce an English five-pound note and
show it to you. That will be his passport. If he does not do so, then do
not give him the letter."

That afternoon I left for Vilna by the Warsaw express, and after a long
journey through the endless pines and silver birches duly arrived at the
hotel indicated, and there awaited my visitor. He arrived next day, a
fair-haired, slim man, just as Rasputin had described him, evidently an
_agent-provocateur_ from Berlin. After he had been ushered into my
bedroom by a waiter, he greeted me warmly, and inquired if I had anything
to hand him.

To this I made an evasive reply, in pretence of being in ignorance of his
meaning, whereupon he said in German:

"Ah! I forgot. You wish first to establish my identity," and laughingly
he produced from his wallet an English five-pound note, which he showed
to me.

In consequence I handed him the letter from the Ministry, which he placed
unopened in his pocket and then left, while that same night I returned to
Petrograd.

Three days later I learned the truth.

Ivan Botkine, the trusted secret agent of the Prime Minister Kokovtsov,
who had left Berlin on the twenty-second for Petrograd, had been found
dead in one of the sleeping compartments on the arrival of the train at
the frontier station of Wirballen. His pockets and valise had been
rifled, and an inquiry had been opened. Though the doctors disagreed as
to the exact cause of death, it was apparent that one of the dishes he
had eaten in the restaurant car an hour before had been poisoned.

Further, I have since established the horrifying fact that the mysterious
letter from the Ministry which I handed to Heckel in Vilna contained a
secret poison! That it was used to remove poor Botkine, Rasputin
afterwards admitted to me. Such were the methods of the camarilla
who were ruling Russia!




CHAPTER VI

RASPUTIN IN BERLIN


TRULY, our Russia was a country of blood and tears under the last of the
Romanoffs. Its creed and its motto was "Gallows and Siberia!"

No man's life was safe under a régime run by scoundrels, of whom
"Grichka," my chief, was the worst.

An unlimited secret fund was placed at the disposal of the Ministry of
the Interior for purposes of the Secret Police, and when I say that
Rasputin controlled that Ministry as well as the Emperor himself, it can
easily be understood that all who were loyal Russians were "suspect," and
denunciation throve on all sides. The Okhrana recruited its agents from
all quarters. That is why one was never sure that the stranger who
denounced Rasputin and his friends was not an _agent-provocateur_.

Every Russian subject of any note, and every foreign traveller, was
watched, not because of his disloyalty, but because Rasputin and his
camarilla, including the Empress, feared lest he should discover how they
were daily betraying Russia and its Tsar.

I have been, at Rasputin's orders, many times in the central bureau of
the Secret Police in search of the index-card of some person who had
fallen beneath the monk's displeasure. In these indices and in the
corresponding files the persons concerned were, I found, never designated
by their own names, but by code-names that could be telegraphed if
necessary from city to city. Thus the Deputy Cheidze (since become
famous) was registered under the name of "drawing-room" (gostini), Lenin
(also since famous) as "symbol," Miliukoff as "grass," and
the traitor Soukhomlinoff as "glycerine."

Those were indeed terrible days in Holy Russia--days when the innocent
were sent to their death, while Rasputin, the religious fraud, laughed
and drank champagne with his high-born devotees, who believed him, even
in this twentieth century, to be divine!

I remember that on May 16th, 1914, when the political horizon was
cloudless and no one dreamed of war, I sat in the visitors' gallery of
the Duma, having been sent there by Rasputin to listen to the debate and
report to him.

The labour leader Kerensky, who afterwards became Minister of Justice in
the Provisional Government, rose and from the tribune proclaimed the
infamy of the police. He did not mince matters. He said:

"The most notorious jailers of the period of Alexander III. knew how to
respect in their political enemies the man who thought differently, and
when they shut him up in the fortress of Schlüsselburg they would
sometimes come to chat with him. And some of those martyrs, those men
struggling for liberty, have been able to return to us with the glamour
about them of twenty years' hard labour. But now, the sons of those
famous jailers do not hesitate to seize young men of seventeen or
eighteen and make them die slowly, but surely, under the blows of the
knout, under the strokes of the rod, or by the burns of a red-hot iron.
Are we not returning to the days when political prisoners were walled up
alive? And you imagine, gentlemen, that you can claim for this country
the civilising mission of a European nation!"

He spoke of a man whom I knew well, one of the most sinister persons in
all Russia, a man who, like Rasputin and Stürmer, accepted German gold.
The man's name was Evno Azef, upon whom unfortunately the French
Government bestowed the Legion of Honour.

Before he went to Paris, Azef was a close friend of Rasputin and of
Stürmer. He was a criminal of the worst type, an expert in crime, though
he was a recognised agent of the Russian Political Police. And yet so
clever was he as an _agent-provocateur_ that he actually managed to get
himself elected as director of the Terrorist organisation of Petrograd,
and as a member of the Central Committee of the Socialist Party!

In my presence he one night, when in his cups, boasted to the merry monk
what he had to his credit as a revolutionary. He organised the murders
of the Minister of the Interior, Plehve, and of the Grand Duke Sergius.
It was he who prepared the attempted murders of Admiral Dubassof, the
Governor-General Guerchelman, and the attempt on Nicholas II. The latter
was with Rasputin's knowledge and consent! Perhaps Alexandra Feodorovna
knew of it. Who knows? That she was not so devoted to "Nikki" as she
pretended is well known to everyone who was at the Imperial Court at the
time. Happily, however, the plot failed because of circumstances which
Azef could not control.

The scoundrel also assisted in the drawing up of the plans for the
military mutinies at Moscow, Viborg, and Kronstadt, while he knew
beforehand of the preparations for the assassination of General Sakarof,
and of Governor Bogdanovitch at Ufa, as well as a number of Terrorist
crimes which succeeded.

One of his crimes in conspiracy with Rasputin I will here relate, because
it is a mystery which has long puzzled the London police.

On the morning of January 11th, 1909, the London newspapers contained a
report of a strange discovery. Four days before there had arrived at
Victoria Station a young French lady, dark-haired and extremely
good-looking, who took a cab to a small but highly respectable private
hotel in the vicinity. There she gave the name of Mademoiselle Thomas,
and her profession as governess. Next morning a tall, thin young
foreigner called for her, and they went out together, she returning very
late that night apparently exhausted after a long motor journey. Next day
she remained in her room all day. On the third day an elderly man called,
and she went out with him, being absent about a couple of hours. On her
return she went straight to her room and nothing was seen of her further
until the next day at noon the chambermaid failed to arouse her by
knocking. The police were informed, the door was forced, and Mademoiselle
Thomas was found dead. She was lying upon the floor fully dressed.

The medical evidence at the inquest was that the pretty French governess
had been dead fully eighteen hours. Upon her or in her small hand-luggage
there was nothing to establish her identity. That she had taken poison
was the opinion of the expert medical witness. Yet the poison could not
be established. Apparently it was a case of suicide, for the laundry
marks and names of the makers of her clothing had been deliberately
removed.

One thing, however, was extremely mysterious. Upon the marble top of the
washhand-stand in the bedroom the police found some scrawled words in a
character they could not decipher. Experts were brought in, when it was
found that the writing was in Russian character, and the words were: "The
holy Starets is----"

This conveyed nothing to the London police, who, of course, knew nothing
save that a "Starets" in Russia is a "saint."

Therefore the experts at Scotland Yard were, after much patient
investigation, compelled to dismiss it as one of London's unsolved
mysteries.

Now for the truth.

One night, a year before, when I had returned with Rasputin from
Tsarskoe-Selo, we found awaiting us the somewhat dandified man of a
hundred aliases and as many disguises, the notorious Azef. He greeted us
both warmly, and being a close friend of Rasputin, the monk took him into
his cosy little den, where for over an hour they remained closeted
together.

I was one of the few who knew the secret of Azef's crimes. Indeed, when I
entered the room while the pair were talking I heard him ask with a
laugh:

"What if we give him a taste of the necktie of Stolypin--eh?"

"It certainly would be best, my dear Evno," the monk agreed. "That is if
you think the accusation can be well made."

"Trust me," laughed the great _agent-provocateur_. "A denunciation, the
discovery of papers--you have those of Buchman in your safe, by the way,
and they could be used--arrest, trial, and the necktie! It would be quite
easy, and his mouth would be closed."

"He is growing dangerous," growled Rasputin. "What you say is perfectly
true."

Then turning to me, he said:

"Féodor, bring those papers which Manuiloff brought me a week ago--the
papers used for the arrest of Professor Buchman in Warsaw."

I obeyed, well knowing how that file of incriminating correspondence with
an Anarchist group in Zurich had been forged by Stürmer's secretary
Manuiloff, and how it had been found among the professor's effects.

"The necktie of Stolypin," was Azef's playful allusion to the ever-ready
gallows to which he, plotting with Rasputin, Manuiloff, Guerassimof,
and others, was so constantly sending innocent persons.
Truly, Russia was a strange country even before the outbreak of war.

The immediate object of Azef's activities, combined with Rasputin's, was
at Germany's direction to extend the Terrorist action and thus cause
trouble and unrest in the Empire. By every fresh success he obtained more
money from Berlin, and at the same time strengthened his privileged
position in the ranks of the Terrorists, while his worth was increased in
the eyes of both the Minister of the Interior and of the Emperor. The
scoundrel's revolutionary career and his police career were inseparable.
He was a Terrorist to-day, a police official to-morrow, but, like
Rasputin, a secret agent of Germany always!

Terrible as it may seem, the Okhrana, with the connivance of the
Wilhelmstrasse, and with the Empress's full knowledge--of this there is
no doubt, because documentary evidence exists which proves it--caused the
highest personages in Russia to be murdered or hanged in order to prove
to those lucky ones who survived how necessary was the organisation for
their own existence!

A hundred dramas could be written upon the intrigues of Grichka and Azef.
Some of them were amazing; all were disgraceful. The life of the most
upright and honest man or woman was not safe if marked down by the pair
of scoundrels. The attempt upon Admiral Dubassof, in which Count
Konovnicin met his death; the attempt upon General Guerchelman,
Governor-General of Moscow; the assassination of General Slepzof at Tver,
with half a dozen other murders of the same kind, were all the work of
Azef. Why? Because both Azef and General Guerassimof, chief of the Secret
Police, were in the toils of Germany. The Wilhelmstrasse paid well, but
threatened exposures if this or that person were not removed. Hence Azef,
as one of the heads of the Terrorists, received his orders through
Rasputin, and, obeying, was paid his blood-money.

Many of the dastardly crimes which Azef, aided by the monk, committed at
Germany's orders will never be known. Hundreds of innocent persons were
arrested, and when the police searched their homes the most incriminating
documents were found concealed--documents which when produced they had
never before seen. Hundreds of men and women were hurried to Siberia, and
hundreds of others were sent to rot in jails and fortresses, while upon
dozens there was placed "the necktie of Stolypin."

"Ah! my dear Gregory," Azef said, after he had lit a fresh cigarette,
"there will be no security until that man's mouth is closed. I see that
you agree with me."

"Quite," replied the monk, who, I saw, was rather agitated because of
something which the police spy had told him.

"Good! Then I will go further. To-day I have proposed to the Council of
Workmen's Delegates that we should blow up the Central Bureau of the
Okhrana, with Guerassimof in the centre of it. The killing of Guerassimof
appealed to them. They hate him--as you know. Really, those people are
humorous. They think I am their friend, and yet each day the police
arrest one or two members regularly but quietly, and they disappear no
one knows whither. I have suspicions of Menchikof, of the Okhrana at
Moscow. The other day I met him at Princess Kamenskoi's, and what he
told me set me wondering. He poses as your friend, but I feel convinced
he is your enemy."

Rasputin's bearded face relaxed into that strange, sardonic grin of his
as he replied:

"I know Menchikof. He is harmless. The only man we may fear is Burtsef.
He knows far too much of the police organisation and the deeds of our
provocating agents."

"I agree. But he lives in Paris, and hence the Okhrana cannot lay hands
upon him. If only he would return to Russia, then he would not be long at
liberty. That I assure you."

"He is in Paris. Could we not send him a message that his daughter
Vera--who married young Tchernof last year--has been taken suddenly ill,
and thus summon him at once to Vilna? Once on Russian soil he could be
arrested."

Azef smiled. "Our friend Burtsef knows a little too much of our methods
to fall into such a trap. He would recognise my hand in it in an instant.
No, some other means must be found. Meanwhile we must deal with the
person under discussion. We were agreed that he must be suppressed at all
hazards, eh?"

"Exactly. And we must suppress Burtsef afterwards."

Paris, Lausanne, Geneva, Zurich and Nice swarmed with Russian secret
agents, who, at orders from Azef and Rasputin, kept constant vigil upon
the doings of everyone. The directors of the foreign service of our
political police were Ratchkovsky in Paris, and Rataef in London. The
latter posed as a Russian journalist, and usually spent his afternoons
over cups of coffee in the cosmopolitan Café Royal in Regent Street.

All this I knew, and much more. I knew that Ivan Manuiloff, who was now
secretary to Stürmer, had begun his lucrative career as the agent and
catspaw of Ratchkovsky in Paris. But he intrigued against his chief, and
was then transferred to Rome. Of that man and his dastardly doings I
will tell more later. Suffice it to say that the Emperor so deeply
believed in him that one day he gave him a gold cigarette-case with his
initials in diamonds "as a mark of his esteem"!

Having listened attentively to the conversation between the two
scoundrels, I at last came to the conclusion that they were conspiring
against some mysterious person named Krivochein.

After the pair had consumed a bottle of champagne, Azef rose and, shaking
his friend's dirty paw, said:

"I hope to have everything arranged when we meet. I would not yet mention
the matter to the Empress."

"Of course I shall not," remarked Rasputin, with that crafty grin of his.
"She would only worry over it--and just now she is greatly troubled over
the Tsarevitch. He has had another attack."

The monk did not mention the fact that the cause of the attack was one of
Badmayev's secret drugs which Anna Vyrubova had dissolved in his milk!

After Azef had left, Rasputin flung himself into his easy chair, and as
he lit a cigarette remarked to me:

"Ah, Féodor! What a man! There is nothing he is unable to accomplish."

"He is very daring," I remarked.

"No, it is not daring--it is deep cunning. He has the police at his back;
I have Alexandra Feodorovna--so we win always. But," he added, with a
snarl, "we have enemies, and those must be dealt with--dealt with
drastically. I hear they are setting about more scandals in Petrograd
concerning me. Have you heard them?" he asked.

"Gossip is rife on every hand, and all sorts of wild stories are being
circulated," I said.

"Bah! Let the fools say what they will of Gregory Rasputin," he laughed.
"It only makes him the more popular. It is time, however, that I
performed some more miracles among the poor," he added reflectively. "Let
us arrange some, Féodor. Do not forget it."

The miracles were arranged a fortnight later. With the assistance of a
clever German conjurer named Brockhaus, from Riga, who with others helped
the mock saint on the occasions when he imposed upon the credulity of the
mujiks, he pretended to "heal" a child of lameness, while a female
assistant of Brockhaus, having posed as a blind peasant, was restored to
sight.

The miracles took place out at Ligovo, a village outside Petrograd, and
like wildfire the news was spread that the Holy Father had again taken
compassion upon the people. Hundreds of men and women now flocked round
him to kiss the edge of his ragged robe, and as he passed in the streets
everyone crossed themselves. By such means did Rasputin retain the favour
of the people and of the Empress herself.

One night he received a telegram in cipher, which he gave me to decode.
It had been despatched from Paris and read:

     "The appointment is at Savignyplatz, 17, Charlottenburg. Do not
     fail. Please inform A. [Alexandra Feodorovna] and obtain
     instructions.--EVNO."

At once Rasputin became active. He went to Peterhof, where the Court was
at that moment, and carried out Azef's desire. He was with the Empress
and Madame Vyrubova for a couple of hours ere he rejoined me, and we took
the evening train back to the capital.

That night he called upon Stürmer, who had with him his sycophant and
ex-policeman Manuiloff, and they held counsel together. Then, next
afternoon, we both left Petrograd for Berlin.

We had no difficulty in discovering the house in the Savignyplatz. It was
a good-sized one on the corner of the Kantstrasse, and the old woman who
opened the door at once ushered us into a pretty drawing-room, where we
were greeted by a rather tall, dark-haired and refined young lady, who
welcomed us in Russian, and whose name Rasputin had told me was
Mademoiselle Paula Kereicha.

"You must be very tired after your long journey, Father," she said,
bowing her head and crossing herself as the monk mumbled a blessing upon
her.

"No; travelling is very easy between Petrograd and Berlin," he replied
affably; and then he introduced me.

I could see that somehow she resented my intrusion there. She glanced at
Rasputin inquiringly.

"Oh, no," laughed the monk. "I quite understand, mademoiselle; you need
have no fear." Then lowering his voice to a whisper, he said: "I know
full well that living here as secret agent of the Okhrana you have to
exercise every caution."

Paula Kereicha--who I afterwards found was a second-rate variety actress
who sometimes took engagements in order to blind people to her own
calling, that of police-spy--smiled and admitted that she had to be very
careful.

"It is not the Germans that I fear," she said. "They know me well at the
Wilhelmstrasse, and I am never interfered with. Indeed, they assist me
when necessary. No. It is the Terrorists who would do me harm if they
could. There is a dangerous group here--as you know."

"I know well," said the monk; "only last week Tchapline and Vilieff were
given Stolypin's necktie owing to your denunciations. They came to Russia
from Berlin, and were arrested immediately they set foot across the
frontier."

"No," she protested. "Azef was here. It was he who put papers into their
baggage, and then telegraphed to the police at Wirballen. Neither of the
men was dangerous as far as I could see, but our friend Evno believed
them to be; hence he deemed them better out of the way."

I could see that the young woman had some scruples regarding the dirty
work for which she received money from the Ministry of the Interior in
Petrograd. And surely hers was a highly dangerous profession.

Apparently it was not desired that Rasputin's arrival in Berlin should be
known, for we were shown to our rooms by the stout old Russian woman, and
I heard the handsome Paula speaking on the telephone in a guarded
manner.

"And you will call at half-past nine to-night, eh?" I heard her ask, and
presently she rang off.

We ate our dinner together, the monk being very gracious towards his
mysterious hostess; and almost punctually at half-past nine the door of
the drawing-room opened, and there entered a rather shabbily dressed man,
whom I at once recognised as Count von Wedel, the inseparable companion
of the Kaiser, and titular head of the German Secret Service. With him
was no less a person than the German Foreign Minister, Kiderlen-Waechter.
Our visitors were the two Men Behind the Throne of Imperial Germany.
Standing with them was that man of kaleidoscopic make-up, the great Azef
himself.

That meeting was indeed a dramatic one. Rasputin, taking bribes on every
side from officials in Russia who desired advancement, and from the
Germans to betray Russia into the hands of the Wilhelmstrasse, sat that
evening in the elegant little room listening to the conversation, with
all the craft and cunning of the Russian mujik. He made but few remarks,
but sat with his hands upon his knees, his deep-set, fiery eyes glancing
everywhere about him, his big bejewelled cross scintillating beneath the
electric light of the pretty Paula's elegant, tastily furnished little
room.

Von Wedel, though dressed so shabbily, was the chief spokesman.
Kiderlen-Waechter, who had so cleverly pulled the strings of Germany's
diplomacy in the Near East, and had now been recalled to Berlin and
placed at the helm of the Fatherland's double-dealing with the Powers,
spoke little. He seemed to be learning much of the Kaiser's duplicity.

"The Emperor William, I can tell you frankly, Father, is displeased," von
Wedel said to Rasputin reprovingly. "Only by an ace has the whole of our
arrangements with your Empress, and with yourself as our agent, been
suppressed from Downing Street. And that by steps taken by our friend
here, Monsieur Azef. But we are not yet safe. I tell you quite frankly
that though you are a good servant of ours, yet your habit of taking
intoxicants is dangerous. You boast too much! If you are to succeed you
must assume an attitude of extreme humility combined with poverty. Be a
second St. Francis of Assisi," added the Count, with humour. "You can act
any part. Imitate a real saint."

"It surely is not through a fault of mine that any secret has leaked
out," the monk protested.

"But it is," the Count declared severely. "I am here to-night at the
Emperor's orders to tell you from him that, though he appreciates all
your efforts on his behalf, he disapproves of your drunkenness and your
boastful tongue."

"I am not boastful!" the monk declared. "Have you brought me here to
Berlin to reprimand me? If so, I will return at once."

And he rose arrogantly from his chair, and crossed his hands over his
breast piously in that attitude he assumed when unusually angry.

Von Wedel saw that he was going too far.

"It is not a matter of reproof, but of precaution," he said quickly.
"Happily the truth has been suppressed, though a certain agent of Downing
Street--a man known by the nickname of 'Mac'--very nearly ascertained the
whole facts. Fortunately for us all he did not. But his suspicions are
aroused, together with those of Krivochein."

"Cannot this man Mac--an Englishman, I suppose--be suppressed?" asked
Rasputin. "If he is in Russia I can crush him as a fly upon the
window-pane."

"Ah! but he is not in Russia," replied the Count. "He is a very elusive
person, and one who tricks us every time. 'Mac the Spy,' as they call him
at Whitehall, is the first secret agent in Europe--next, of course, to
our dear Steinhauer."

"I disagree," interrupted the Foreign Secretary. "The man Mac is
marvellous. He was in Constantinople and in Bucharest recently, and he
learned secrets of our Embassy and Legation which I believed to be
sacred. He even got hold of our diplomatic telegraph code a week after it
had been changed. No, the English Mac is the most astute secret agent in
Europe, depend upon it!"

Paula Kereicha sat listening to the conversation, but without making any
remark. I noticed that Azef seemed very uneasy at her presence, and
presently sent her from the room to ask for a telephone call. The instant
she had gone he exclaimed in a low voice:

"It is a pity to have spoken before Paula! She knows too much. One day,
when it suits her, she may reveal something unpleasant concerning us."

"But you made the appointment here, at her house!" Kiderlen-Waechter
protested.

"Of course, because it is the safest meeting-place, but I did not know
that matters were to be freely discussed before her."

"Then you do not trust the woman?" remarked Rasputin. "You are like
myself, I never trust women," and he grinned. "Shall we drop our
conversation when she returns?"

Azef reflected for a few moments.

"No," he said. "She knows most of the details of the affair. There is no
reason why she should not know the rest. Besides, I may require her to
assist me."

In the discussion which ensued I gathered that Rasputin and Azef had
resolved, with the connivance and at the instigation of the German
Foreign Office, to assassinate a certain well-known British member of
Parliament who had been in Russia and had learned, through the British
secret agent Mac, the betrayal of Russia into the hands of the
Wilhelmstrasse. It was believed that this Englishman--whom Rasputin had
nicknamed "Krivochein," so that in correspondence his identity should not
be revealed--would place certain facts before the British Government to
the detriment of the plans of the pro-German party in Russia.

Of the actual identity of the unfortunate member of Parliament whom Azef
and Rasputin had marked down as their victim I could not learn. No doubt
Paula knew who "Krivochein" was. And it was certain also that both von
Wedel and the German Foreign Secretary were privy to the plot.

Apparently the Empress had been informed of the danger, and knew of the
steps the conspirators were taking. Indeed, Rasputin declared:

"Alexandra Feodorovna is very anxious as to the future. She has had a
violent quarrel with Nicholas regarding his refusal to dismiss
Sheglovitof."

"He must be dismissed," declared von Wedel. "The Emperor William insists
upon it. Each hour he remains in office he becomes more dangerous."

"I am already engineering disagreements in the Duma," the monk replied.
"If he does not fall by them, then he will go naturally, for he is not a
puppet hypnotised by the wishes of Tsarskoe-Selo, as are so many of our
Ministers. The Tsar, who so quickly takes offence nowadays, prefers
flunkeys to Ministers whose personality is too marked. Besides, we have
the Woman [the Empress] ever on our side. No, Sheglovitof's hour has
come."

The meeting lasted nearly three hours, until at last Azef and the two
German officials left, and Rasputin went to his room, where he consumed
half a bottle of brandy. Meanwhile I sat chatting with Mademoiselle Paula
until it was time to retire.

Next day, in consequence of a telephone message, I left with Rasputin for
Paris, where we put up at the Grand Hotel, being visited on the day
following our arrival by Azef, who, dressed differently, I would
certainly have passed in the street unrecognised. The two scoundrels
retired to Rasputin's room, where they remained for half an hour, and
then we all three went forth into the sunshine of the boulevard.

"It is about his time to pass," the notorious spy remarked to the monk,
who, by the way, wore an ordinary suit of tweeds and a soft felt hat.
"Let us sit here--at the Grand Café."

In consequence we took seats at one of the little tables on the
_terrasse_ and ordered "bocks."

Presently, as we watched the stream of passers-by, Azef raised the
newspaper he had been pretending to read, so concealing his face, and
whispered:

"Here he is! That is our friend Krivochein!"

I looked and saw a well-dressed, quiet-looking English gentleman passing
along with his wife, who had apparently been shopping. Little did he
dream that the eyes of the two most evil men in Europe were upon him.

"He leaves to-night on his return to London," remarked Azef, when five
minutes later we rose and returned to the hotel.

That same afternoon Rasputin, who declared that he had a bad headache,
sent me to an English chemist's in the Avenue de l'Opéra for a bottle of
tabloids of aspirin. I was rather surprised, for he never took drugs.
When I gave him the little bottle he drew out the plug of cotton-wool and
extracted a tabloid, which he put upon his dressing-table, afterwards
replacing the wool.

About six o'clock a lady was announced, and when she was shown up to our
sitting-room I found to my surprise that it was Paula Kereicha.

Rasputin was out with Azef, so Paula declared that she would wait till
their return.

"I am staying at the Hôtel Chatham, and have to go to London to-morrow,"
she told me. "Krivochein has left the Chatham with his wife, and I am to
follow."

"The Father and Azef have gone round to the Chatham," I said. "They are
evidently hoping to find you there."

"Ah! Then I will return and see if they are there," she said, and,
rising, she left.

I did not see her again. She went to London next day, according to Azef's
instructions, and as a French governess took a room in that quiet hotel
near Victoria Station--the room wherein she was afterwards found dead.

At the time I had no knowledge of the tragedy, but later on I learned
from Rasputin's own lips, while in one of his drunken, boastful moods,
how he had introduced into the bottle of aspirin a single tabloid of one
of Badmayev's secret poisons, made up to resemble exactly the other
tabloids. With Azef he had gone to the Hôtel Chatham on purpose to
extract from her dressing-case her own bottle of aspirin--which she had
purchased on the previous day from the same chemist in the Avenue de
l'Opéra--and replace it by the one containing the fatal dose.

The latter she had swallowed in ignorance because of a headache, death
ensuing in a few seconds, and the post-mortem revealed nothing.

"Ah! my dear Féodor, that girl knew far too much! Besides, we discovered
that, though she had been sent by our friend Azef to assist two of our
friends to bring 'Krivochein's' career to a sudden end, she had actually
warned him, so that he has succeeded in escaping to America to avoid us!"




CHAPTER VII

SCANDAL AND BLACKMAIL


AS the power of the monk Rasputin increased, so also my own social
position became advanced, until as the "saint's" confidential secretary,
and therefore as one who had his ear, I became on friendly terms with
half the nobility of Petrograd.

The pious fraud declared to true believers, "If you do not heed me, then
God will abandon you."

Leading as he was, freely and openly, a life of shameless debauchery,
wholesale blackmail and political intrigue, it is marvellous how his
power became so unlimited. To those who disbelieved in his doctrine or
in his divinity, he simply smiled evilly, and said: "If you fail to do my
bidding you will be punished by my friends."

Such warning was sufficient. Everyone knew that Rasputin's power was
already, in 1912, greater than that of the Tsar Nicholas himself. Day
after day ambitious men called at the house in the Gorokhovaya, to which
we had now moved, all of them anxious for ministerial and clerical
appointments, which he obtained for them at prices fixed by himself. The
highest in the land bowed before the rascal, while any man who dared to
belittle him, or attempt to thwart his evil designs, was at once removed
from office. Through Madame Vyrubova, who received her share of the
spoils and acted upon the Empress, Rasputin reigned as Tsar, the Emperor
doing little but sign his name to documents placed before him.

Thus Russia was compelled to witness a regular procession of officials
whom the "man of God" appointed, in accordance with value received. Even
Goremykin was compelled to bow before the mystic humbug. Rasputin for
five years caused to be appointed or dismissed all the bishops, and woe
betide any person who attempted to interfere with his power.

The Archbishop Theophanus, full of remorse at having lent a helping hand
to the scoundrel, tried to overthrow him by publicly denouncing his evil
practices, while the Bishop Hermogenes, who knew of the monk's past,
attempted to reveal it. In an instant the vengeance of Rasputin fell upon
them, Theophanus being sent to Tadriz, and Hermogenes confined to a
monastery. Helidor was hunted by the police and sought asylum abroad;
while a man named Grinevitch, who had also known Rasputin long ago at
Pokrovsky, was invited to dinner by the monk one night, and next morning
was found dead in his bed; while another was arrested by the police on a
false charge of conspiracy, and sent to prison for ten years, though
perfectly innocent.

Rasputin's overbearing insolence knew no bounds. Now that he was the
power behind the Throne, he compelled all to bow to him, the educated as
well as the peasantry. On entering a house, whether that of prince or
peasant, he would invariably kiss the young and pretty women, while he
would turn his back upon and refuse even to speak with those who were
older.

Our new house was larger and more luxurious than the old one. But it also
had the false telephone in the study, which was supposed by the "saint's"
dupes to be a private wire to the palace of Tsarskoe-Selo! The house had
been furnished entirely at the expense of the Empress, with valuable
Eastern carpets, fine furniture, tasteful hangings of silk, beautiful
pictures, autographed portraits of their Majesties, and, of course, ikons
of all sorts and sizes to impress the pious.

An example of the rogue's impudence occurred on Easter Day in 1912. We
were breakfasting with Madame Vyrubova's sister at her house just off the
Nevski. With us was Boris Stürmer and two minor officials of the Court,
and we were awaiting the coming of the Tsaritza's favourite lady in
waiting.

At last she arrived from Tsarskoe-Selo bearing a parcel for Grichka,
which she gave him merrily, saying:

"The Empress has made this for you with her own hands. She spent part of
last night in finishing it for you, so that you should have it as an
Easter present."

The "saint" cut the string and withdrew a blue silk coat of the kind he
was in the habit of wearing, in the Russian style, over loose trousers
and high boots of patent leather.

"Alix wishes you to wear it to-day," Madame Vyrubova went on, "after you
have taken Holy Communion."

Rasputin, with a disappointed look, cast it and its paper upon the floor,
and said:

"Now let us have breakfast," and promptly began to eat with his fingers,
as he a

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