The Secrets of Potsdam
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"Ha, my dear Ferdinand!" cried the Prince, shaking the hand of the man who so suddenly became world-famous at the age of seventy. "You have travelled from Stuttgart to see me – unwell as you are! It is an honour. But the matter is one of greatest urgency, as I have already written to you. I want to show you the correspondence and seek your advice," and the Prince invited his white-haired friend to the big, carved arm-chair beside his writing-table. Then, turning to me, he said: "Will you see Von Glasenapp for me, and hand him those orders for Posen? He must leave to-night. The General Court-Martial at Stendal I have fixed for the 25th. I shall be with the Emperor this afternoon. Report here at seven to-night – understand?"
Thus was I dismissed, while His Imperial Highness and Count Zeppelin sat together in secret counsel.
At ten minutes to seven that evening I unlocked the Crown-Prince's room with the key I carried, the other two keys being in the hands of the Crown-Princess and her husband. I had placed upon the table a bundle of reports which had just been brought round from the Ministry of War, and required that scribbly signature, "Wilhelm Kronprinz," when I noticed three private letters that had evidently been placed aside. The envelopes were addressed in a thin, angular, female hand, and bore an English address. I noted it. The name on each was that of a lady residing in Aylesbury Avenue, Hampstead, London. The letters bore German stamps. In keen curiosity, I took one and examined it, wondering whether it could be the correspondence which the Crown-Prince had been so eager to show Count von Zeppelin in secret.
I drew the letter from the envelope and scanned it rapidly.
What I read caused me to hold my breath. The signature to the letters was "Enid von Leutenberg."
Those letters of hers had, it was plain, been seized in the post on their way to London. The Countess either had a traitor in her household or secret watch was being kept by the Secret Service upon her correspondence.
All three of those letters I read – letters which opened my eyes and broadened my mind. Then, taking up my bundle of reports, I crept away from the room, carefully re-latching the door. I intended that his Highness should return, discover the letters left there inadvertently, and put them away ere my arrival, in which case he would never suspect that I had any knowledge of their contents.
With the papers in my hand I passed along the many carpeted corridors to the south wing of the Palace, where I found Tresternitz, Marshal of the Prince's Court, in his room.
The Crown-Prince imitated his father's sharp punctuality, therefore I knew that he would be there at seven or soon afterwards.
Tresternitz was always full of scandal concerning those who lived in the higher circles of Berlin, and it was to one of these stories of Court scandal concerning one of the ladies-in-waiting which I listened while I smoked one of his excellent Russian cigarettes.
Then, glancing at the clock, I rose suddenly and left him, returning again to the private room.
I found his Highness there, and as I entered I noticed that he had hidden those remarkable letters which he had in secret shown to Count Zeppelin.
A fortnight went past. The Kaiser, with his mad love of constant travel, had been rushing up and down the Empire – to Krupp's at Essen, to the trials of a newly-invented howitzer, thence to an inspection at Kassel, and afterwards to unveil monuments at Cologne and at Erfurt. The Crown-Prince and Princess had accompanied him, the Kaiserin being indisposed, and I, of course, had been included in "Willie's" suite.
The week had been a strenuous one of train-travel, luncheons, tiring dinners, receptions, dancing, and general junketings, and I was glad enough to get back to my bachelor rooms – those rooms in the Krausenstrasse that you knew so well before the bursting of the war-cloud. To dance attendance upon an Imperial Crown-Prince, as well as upon an autocratic Emperor, becomes after a time a wearisome business, however gay and cosmopolitan a man may be.
I had only been at home a few hours when a telephone message summoned me at five o'clock to the Crown-Prince's Palace.
His Imperial Highness, who had, I knew, been lunching with the Emperor at the Königliches Schloss across the bridge, seemed unusually serious and thoughtful. Perhaps the Emperor had again shown his anger at his peccadilloes, as he did so frequently.
"Count," he said, after a few seconds of silence, during which I noted that upon his table lay a private letter from the German Ambassador in London. "You will recall my conversation regarding the Countess von Leutenberg – eh?"
"Perfectly," was my reply.
"I told you that I should require you to introduce me," he said. "Well, I want you to do so this evening. She has taken a box at the Königliche Opera to-night, where they are to play Falstaff. I shall be there, and you will be with me. Then you will introduce me to your pretty friend. Understand?" And he grinned.
That night, in accordance with my instructions, I sat in the Emperor's box with the Crown-Prince, Tresternitz, and two personal-adjutants, and, recognizing the Countess von Leutenberg in a box opposite, accompanied by an elderly lady, I took the Crown-Prince round, and there presented her to him, greatly to her surprise and undisguised delight.
The Prince and the Countess chatted together, while I sat with her elderly companion. Then, when we had withdrawn, my Imperial Master exclaimed:
"Ah! my dear Heltzendorff. Why, she is one of the prettiest women in all Berlin! Surely it is unfortunate – most unfortunate."
What was unfortunate? I was further puzzled by that last sentence, yet I dare not ask any explanation, and we went back to our own box.
After our return to the Palace the Crown-Prince, who was standing in one of the corridors talking with the slim, fair-haired Baroness von Wedel, one of his wife's ladies-in-waiting, left her and beckoned me into an adjoining room.
"I wish you, Heltzendorff, to call upon the Countess von Leutenberg at nine o'clock to-morrow evening. She will expect you."
I looked at his Highness, much puzzled. How did he know that the pretty Countess would expect me?
But he gave me no time to reply, merely turning upon his heel, and striding down the corridor to the private apartments.
Punctually at nine o'clock that wintry evening I called at the Lennestrasse, but Josef, the elderly manservant, informed me that his mistress was engaged, adding that His Imperial Highness the Crown-Prince had paid a surprise call.
"The Crown-Prince here!" I gasped, astounded.
"Yes, Count. And, further, my mistress is in high glee, for my master returned this morning quite unexpectedly from London. He has been out at the Ministry for Foreign Affairs all the evening, and I expect him home at any moment. The Crown-Prince ordered me to ask you to await him here."
Count von Leutenberg in Berlin! What did it mean? He was absurdly jealous, I recollected. He might return at any moment and find the Crown-Prince alone in the Countess's drawing-room. If so, the situation might certainly be a most unpleasant one.
Hardly had the thought crossed my mind when I heard the Count enter, his spurs clinking and his sabre rattling as he strode up the stairs.
I crept forth, listening breathlessly.
A few seconds later I heard the Count's voice raised in anger and high, bitter words. Next moment I sprang up the stairs and, dashing into the room, found the pretty Countess standing near the window, white and rigid as a statue, while the two men in uniform faced each other. Von Leutenberg's countenance was distorted with rage as he abused the Crown-Prince, and openly charged him with having brought about his exile to London.
His Highness made no reply, but only smiled sarcastically and shrugged his narrow shoulders.
So enraged the other became at this latter gesture that, with a sudden movement, he drew his sword.
The Countess shrieked and swooned as I sprang forward and stayed her husband's hand.
It was a dramatic moment. The Count instantly realized the enormity of his crime, and his hand dropped.
"Enough!" cried the Crown-Prince, waving his adversary aside. Then, turning to me, he said in a calm, hard voice:
"Heltzendorff, you are witness that this man has drawn his sword upon the heir to the Throne."
And with those haughty words he bowed stiffly and strode out of the room.
Two hours later I was commanded to the Kaiser's presence, and found him in counsel with his son.
The Emperor, who wore the uniform of the Guards, looked pale and troubled, yet in his eyes there was a keen, determined look. As I passed the sentries and entered the lofty study, with its upholstery and walls of pale green damask – that room from which the Empire and the whole world have so often been addressed – the Kaiser broke off short in his conversation.
Turning to me as he still sat at his littered table, he said in that quick, impetuous way of his:
"Count Heltzendorff, the Crown-Prince has informed me of what has occurred this evening in the Lennestrasse. I wish you to convey this at once to Count von Leutenberg and to give it into his own hand. There is no reply."
And His Majesty handed me a rather bulky envelope addressed in his own bold handwriting, and bearing his own private cipher impressed in black wax.
Thus commanded, I bowed, withdrew, and took a taxicab straight to the Lennestrasse, being ushered by Josef into the presence of husband and wife in that same room I had quitted a couple of hours before.
I handed the Count the packet the Emperor had given me, and with trembling fingers he tore it open.
From within he drew three letters, those same letters which his wife had written to London, and which had been intercepted by the Secret Service – the letters which I had read in his Highness's room.
As he scanned the lines which the Emperor had penned his face blanched. A loud cry of dismay escaped his wife as she recognized her own letters, and she snatched the note from her husband's hand and also read it.
The light died instantly from her beautiful countenance. Then, turning to me, she said in a hoarse, hopeless tone:
"Thank you, Count von Heltzendorff. Tell His Majesty the Emperor that his command shall be – yes, it shall be obeyed."
Those last words she spoke in a deep, hoarse whisper, a strange, wild look of desperation in her blue eyes.
An hour later I reported again at the Imperial Palace, was granted audience of the Emperor, and gave him the verbal reply.
His Majesty uttered no word, merely nodding his head slowly in approval.
Next afternoon a painful sensation was caused throughout Berlin when the Abendpost published the news that Count von Leutenberg, the man so recently promoted by the Emperor, and his pretty wife had both been found dead in their room. During the night they had evidently burned some papers, for the tinder was found in the stove, and having agreed to die together, they being so much attached during life, they had both taken prussic acid in some wine, the bottle and half-emptied glasses being still upon the table.
The romantic affair, the truth of which I here reveal for the first time, was regarded by all Berlin as an inexplicable tragedy. The public are still unaware of how those intercepted letters contained serious warnings to the British Government of the Emperor's hostile intentions towards Britain, and the probable date of the outbreak of war. Indeed, they recounted a private conversation which the Countess had overheard between the Kaiser and Count Zeppelin, repeating certain opprobrious epithets which the All-Highest had bestowed upon one or two British statesmen, and she also pointed out the great danger of a pending rupture between the two Powers, as well as explaining some details regarding the improved Zeppelins in course of construction secretly on Lake Constance, and certain scandals regarding the private life of the Crown-Prince.
It was for the latter reason that the heir, aided by the War-Lord, took his revenge in a manner so crafty, so subtle, and so typical of the innate cunning of the Hohenzollerns.
Thus the well-meant warnings of one of your good, honest Englishwomen never reached the unsuspicious address to which they were sent, and thus did "Willie" – who, as I afterwards discovered, devised that subtle vengeance – act as the Emperor's catspaw.
SECRET NUMBER TWO
THE CROWN-PRINCE'S REVENGE
The Trautmann affair was one which caused a wild sensation at Potsdam in the autumn of 1912.
In the Emperor's immediate entourage there was a great deal of gossip, most of it ill-natured and cruel, for most ladies-in-waiting possess serpents' tongues. Their tongues are as sharp as their features, and though there may be a few pretty maids-of-honour, yet the majority of women at Court are, as you know, my dear Le Queux, mostly plain and uninteresting.
I became implicated in the unsavoury Trautmann affair, in a somewhat curious manner.
A few months after the Leutenberg tragedy I chanced to be lunching at the "Esplanade" in Berlin, chatting with Laroque, of the French Embassy. Our hostess was Frau Breitenbach, a wealthy Jewess – a woman who came from Dortmund – and who was spending money like water in order to wriggle into Berlin society. As personal-adjutant of the Crown-Prince I was, of course, one of the principal guests, and I suspected that she was angling for a card of invitation to the next ball at the Marmor Palace.
Who introduced me to the portly, black-haired, rather handsome woman I quite forget. Probably it was some nobody who received a commission upon the introduction – for at the Berlin Court introductions are bought and sold just as the succulent sausage is sold over the counter.
In the big white-and-gold salle-à-manger of the "Esplanade," which, as you know, is one of the finest in Europe, Frau Breitenbach was lunching with sixteen guests at one big round table, her daughter Elise, a very smartly dressed girl of nineteen, seated opposite to her. It was a merry party, including as it did some of the most renowned persons in the Empire, among them being the Imperial Chancellor, Bethmann-Hollweg, of the long, grave face and pointed beard, and that grand seigneur who was a favourite at Court, the multi-millionaire Serene Highness Prince Maximilian Egon zu Fürstenberg. Of the latter it may be said that no man rivalled his influence with the Emperor. What he said was law in Germany.
Fürstenberg was head of the famous "Prince's Trust," now dissolved, but at that time, with its capital of a hundred million pounds, it was a great force in the German commercial world. Indeed, such a boon companion was he of the Kaiser's that an august but purely decorative and ceremonial place was actually invented for him as Colonel-Marshal of the Prussian Court, an excuse to wear a gay uniform and gorgeous decorations as befitted a man who, possessing twenty millions sterling, was an important asset to the Emperor in his deep-laid scheme for world-power.
Another Prince of the "Trust" was fat old Kraft zu Hohenlohe Oehringen, but as he had only a paltry ten millions he did not rank so high in the War-Lord's favour.
Fürstenberg, seated next to the estimable Jewess, was chatting affably with her. Her husband was in America upon some big steel transaction, but her pretty daughter Elise sat laughing merrily with a young, square-headed lieutenant of the Death's Head Hussars.
That merry luncheon party was the prologue of a very curious drama.
I was discussing the occult with a middle-aged lady on my right, a sister of Herr Alfred Ballin, the shipping king. In society discussions upon the occult are always illuminating, and as we chatted I noticed that far across the crowded room, at a table set in a window, there sat alone a dark-haired, sallow, good-looking young civilian, who, immaculate in a grey suit, was eating his lunch in a rather bored manner, yet his eyes were fixed straight upon the handsome, dark-haired young girl, Elise Breitenbach, as though she exercised over him some strange fascination.
Half a dozen times I glanced across, and on each occasion saw that the young man had no eyes for the notables around the table, his gaze being fixed upon the daughter of the great financier, whose interests, especially in America, were so widespread and profitable.
Somehow – why I cannot even now decide – I felt a distinct belief that the young civilian's face was familiar to me. It was not the first time I had seen him, yet I could not recall the circumstances in which we had met. I examined my memory, but could not recollect where I had before seen him, yet I felt convinced that it was in circumstances of a somewhat mysterious kind.
Two nights later I had dined with the Breitenbachs at their fine house in the Alsenstrasse. The only guest beside myself was the thin-faced, loud-speaking old Countess von Bassewitz, and after dinner, served in a gorgeous dining-room which everywhere betrayed the florid taste of the parvenu, Frau Breitenbach took the Countess aside to talk, while I wandered with her daughter into the winter garden, with its high palms and gorgeous exotics, that overlooked the gardens of the Austrian Embassy.
When we were seated in cane chairs, and the man had brought us coffee, the pretty Elise commenced to question me about life at the Crown-Prince's Court, expressing much curiosity concerning the private life of His Imperial Highness.
Such questions came often from the lips of young girls in society, and I knew how to answer them with both humour and politeness.
"How intensely interesting it must be to be personal-adjutant to the Crown-Prince! Mother is dying to get a command to one of the receptions at Potsdam," the girl said. "Only to-day she was wondering – well, whether you could possibly use your influence in that direction?"
In an instant I saw why I had been invited to dinners and luncheons so often, and why I had been left alone with the sweet-faced, dark-eyed girl.
I reflected a moment. Then I said:
"I do not think that will be very difficult. I will see what can be done. But I hope that if I am successful you will accompany your mother," I added courteously, as I lit a cigarette.
"It is really most kind of you," the girl declared, springing up with delight, for the mere thought of going to Court seemed to give her intense pleasure. Yet all women, young and old, are alike in that respect. The struggle to set foot near the throne is, as you yourself have seen, always an unseemly one, and, alas! the cause of many heart-burnings.
When I looked in at Tresternitz's room in the Palace next morning, I scribbled down the name of mother and daughter for cards.
"Who are they?" grunted the old marshal, removing a big cigar from his puffy lips.
"People I know – they're all right, and the girl is very good-looking."
"Good. We can do with a little beauty here nowadays. We've had an infernally ugly lot at the balls lately," declared the man, who was the greatest gossip at Court, and who thereupon commenced to tell me a scandalous story regarding one of the ladies-in-waiting to the Kaiserin who had disappeared from the New Palace, and was believed to be living in Scotland.
"The Emperor is furious," he added. "But he doesn't know the real truth, and never will, I expect."
A week later the Crown-Prince and Princess gave a grand ball at the Marmor Palace at Potsdam, and the Emperor himself attended.
Frau Breitenbach, gorgeously attired, made her bow before the All-Highest, and her daughter did the same.
That night I saw that the Kaiser was in no good mood. He seldom was at the Court functions. Indeed, half an hour before his arrival the Crown-Prince had told me, in confidence, of his father's annoyance at the failure of some diplomatic negotiations with Britain.
The Emperor, in his brilliant uniform, with the Order of the Black Eagle, of which he was chef-souverain, and the diamond stars of many foreign Orders, presented a truly Imperial figure, his shrewd, unrelenting gaze everywhere, his upturned moustache accentuated, his voice unusually sharp and commanding.
I spoke with Elise, and afterwards, when I danced with her I saw how impressed she was by the glitter and glamour of the Potsdam Court circle, and by the fact that she was in the presence of the All-Highest One, without whose gracious nod nothing could hope to prosper in the Fatherland, and without whose approval no public work could be undertaken in Berlin. Those statesmen, admirals and generals present might plan, but he alone willed. His approval or his frown was as a decree of Providence, and his autocratic will greater than that of his "brother," Nicholas of Russia.
I remember how, one day in the Militär-Kabinett, an old buffer at Court whom we called "Hans" Hohenlohe – he was one of the hundred and sixty odd members of the aristocratic family of Hohenlohe which swarm the Fatherland, mostly penurious, by-the-way, salary-grabbers, all elbowing each other to secure the Kaiser's favour – made a very true remark which has ever remained in my memory. It was very soon after Herr von Libenau, the Imperial Master of Ceremony, had been arrested owing to a scandal at Court, though perfectly innocent. My friend "Hans" Hohenlohe said in a low, confidential whisper at a shooting party, after the French Ambassador had wished us a merry bon jour and passed out:
"My dear friend Heltzendorff, you, like myself, know that war is inevitable. It must come soon! The reason is to be found in the madness of the Emperor, which has spread among our military party and among the people, till most of them are no more sane than himself. Hypnotized by good fortune, we have become demented with an overweening vanity and a philosophy which must end in our undoing. The Emperor's incessant drum-beating, sabre-rattling, and blasphemous appeals to the Almighty have brought our German nation to that state which, since the world began, has ever gone before destruction."
No truer words were ever spoken of modern Germany.
They recurred to me as, while waltzing with the pretty daughter of the Dortmund parvenu, I noticed the Emperor standing aside, chatting with old Von Zeppelin, who every now and then patted his silvery hair, a habit of his when in conversation. With the pair stood Ernst Auguste, the young Duke of Brunswick, who in the following year married the Emperor's daughter, the rather petulant and go-ahead Victoria Louise. The Prince, who wore the uniform of the Prussian Guard, was laughing heartily over some remark of old Zeppelin's as, with my partner, I passed quite close to them.
The dainty Elise was, I found, quite an entertaining little person. Old Tresternitz had already whispered his opinion of her.
"Undoubtedly the prettiest girl at Court," he had declared, with a twinkle in his grey eyes.
From words the pretty Elise let drop that night as she hung upon my arm I wondered whether she was really as ingenuous as she pretended. And yet Frau Breitenbach was one of dozens of others who strove to enter the Court circle, flapping their wings vainly to try and cross the wide gulf which separated the "high life" in Berlin from "Court life."
The rooms were stifling, therefore I took my pretty dancing partner along a corridor and through several deserted apartments into the east wing of the Palace, showing her some of the Crown-Princess's private rooms, until at length we stepped through a French window on to the long terrace before the lake, the Heilige-See.
There we were alone. The white moon was reflected upon the waters, and after the heat of the ball-room the balmy air was delightful.
Against the marble balustrade beside the water I stood chatting with her. All was silent save for the tramp of soldiers passing near, for the guard was at that hour changing. As became a courtier, I chaffed and laughed with her, my intention being to learn more concerning her.
But she was, I found, an extremely discreet and clever little person, a fact which further increased the mystery.
One night about two months later I had an appointment with Max Reinhardt at the Deutsches Theater, in Berlin, to arrange a Royal visit there, and after the performance I went back to the Palace, prior to retiring to my rooms in the Krausenstrasse. The guards saluted as I crossed the dark courtyard, and having passed through the corridors to the private apartments I entered with my key the Crown-Prince's locked study.