w near, I
summoned all my energies to meet it.

I alighted in Berlin armed only with two weapons, the passport made
out in the name of Petrovitch, and a fairly accurate knowledge of the
schemes, or at all events the hopes, of the German Government.

From the first beginning of my long investigation, all the clues I
had picked up had led steadily in one direction.

The great disorganized Empire of the Czar's, with its feeble-willed
autocrat, its insubordinate grand dukes, its rival ministers pulling
different ways, and its greedy officials whose country was their
pocket, had been silently and steadily enfolded in the invisible web
of German statecraft.

The brilliant personality of Wilhelm II had magnetized the
vacillating, timorous Nicholas. Count Buelow had courted the Russian
Foreign Office with the assiduous arts of a lover, and his wooing had
been crowned by complete success. Through Petrovitch the grand dukes
had been indirectly bribed, and the smaller fry like M. Auguste had
been bought outright. Even the Army and Navy had been cajoled, or
bought, or terrorized by pretended revelations of Japanese designs.

Russia had become a supple implement in the hands of the German
Kaiser, the sovereign who for nearly twenty years had been striving
toward one goal by a hundred different crooked paths.

It was evident that the unexplained disappearance of Petrovitch must
have struck consternation into his employers. I suspected that the
Princess Y---- had been summoned to Berlin to throw light on the
event, and possibly to be furnished with instructions which would
enable her to take over the dead man's work.

My position was now peculiarly difficult. I wished to get in touch
with the principals for whom Petrovitch had acted, but to avoid, if
possible, meeting any one who had known him personally.

Above all, I was determined not to risk an encounter with Sophia. She
knew that I was still alive, and I feared that her feminine
intuition, quickened by love, would penetrate through whatever
disguise I might adopt.

Under these circumstances I decided to begin by approaching Herr
Finkelstein, the head of the imperial Secret Service in Berlin.

This man was an old crony of mine. While a magnificent organizer of
espionage, he was a poor observer himself, and I had already
succeeded on one occasion in imposing myself on him under a false
identity.

I had brought with me the papers which I had obtained by bribery from
t