Chapter IV: Part 4

Her method was characteristic. Marov’s situation was such that she could not spend her entire day at his side, and the resources of bomb-riven Vittel were poor in the extreme for a woman of her tastes. No one who has not endured it can picture the drab misery, the pitiless discomfort, the utter stagnation of life in those overcrowded villages just behind the lines. Social intercourse, already hampered by regulations, was swamped beneath military requirements. For entertainment during her leisure, then, Mata Hari turned to the officers who were stationed in the neighbourhood and to those, still more numerous, who were passing through the town. The military activity was such that the French army appeared to have begun an involved game of general post, so that there were new faces in the town each day. For all and sundry, Mata Hari had a ready welcome that was characterized by an entire absence of modest reticences; she accepted as lovers any officers whom her fickle fancy chanced to alight on. In extenuation of this prostitution it is urged that she was forced to sell her body in order to procure funds to supplement Captain Marov’s meagre hospital fare.

The stage was admirably set for an orgy of riotous licentiousness. Incoming troops, aware of the significance of their movement, recognized that tomorrow would find them in the line, exposed to the abomination of trench life in winter, while here a charming hostess was spreading out for their delight such pleasures as might be their last earthly revel. The lust of these men who were turning their backs on all that was natural, refreshing, and pleasant in their lives to face unmitigated misery, was only equalled by the trench-weary veterans whom they relieved. These men grasped greedily at the first opportunity to savour joys after weeks of deprivation in the front lines.

Most favoured of all her companions were the airmen from neighbouring squadrons, those young heroes who sported with death in many forms and who enjoyed a species of dark exaltation in the mortuary horror of their tasks; these were singled out for special favour, and as a class airmen have never been distinguished for restraint. Many of the young pilots were permitted to share her intimacy and cheer her loneliness with their stories, for which she rewarded them with wine-scented kisses and the bliss of intoxication.

The ever-watchful agents of the counter-espionage service missed none of this. Her voluminous correspondence was carefully examined without revealing anything but the most innocent communications between friends who tried to beguile her self-imposed exile. The monotonous regularity of her life was only interrupted by an occasional visit to Paris in the interest of her patient. So unprofitable were the watches of these patient officers that they were forced to wonder whether they were not labouring under a misapprehension in endeavouring to convict this woman of intelligence with the enemy. Spying in the forward area was an entirely different matter to doing the same kind of work under concealment of life in a crowded city where the indifferent civilians had not the same motives of self-preservation in watching for and suspecting any possible betrayers.

So passed the months of July and August to an increasing crescendo of bustle and excitement as the troops prepared for the approach of zero day for the great offensive. All might go well if only the increased activity in the Vosges and the Argonne had succeeded in concealing from the enemy the time and the locale of the real assault. It was the duty of the counter-espionage agents to ensure that no tidings of the forthcoming attack were communicated to the expectant enemy and they relaxed nothing of their effort. Finally all was ready.

Shortly after mid-day on September 25th the infantry attack in Artois was launched. The surprise was as complete as could be expected after such elaborate preparation. The German barrage was laid down too late and the subsequent confusion prevented the artillery from supporting the infantry. The German reserves for the defence of Vimy Ridge were not available. Nothing but the mud held back the impetuous French. For three days the surprised German command experienced acute anxiety.

Further south the attack experienced greater difficulty. The resistance was greater than had been anticipated because, when the attack was planned the defensive force consisted of 90 battalions; when it was launched this force has been increased to 192 battalions. But the heavy artillery preparation ensured a certain amount of success in several localities. Ground was gained in the advanced positions but the results were far from the high hopes raised by the optimistic staff who had forged this powerful weapon which was to open the way to the enemy’s rear positions.

In several places the German front line still held its ground in spite of the overwhelming force directed against it and a week later the entire second position remained intact. When a general order closed the operations the French had lost 80,000 killed and 100,000 wounded.

Heavy as were these losses and inconsiderable the gain nothing but the paralysis of the German high command was responsible for omitting to furnish the means of making the former heavier and the latter less. As early as August 15th the place and time of attack was known to the lower commands, as was shown by an order of General von Ditfurth. The means taken to encounter it have been described by one German authority, General Feyler, as a “hotch potch” in which units were split up and sent to different localities, thus losing their _esprit de corps_.

The main objects were far from being accomplished. The eastern front had not been relieved of pressure and Vouziers, the local objective, was still far distant. To admit that the army had been betrayed was too damaging a confession to make after raising such high hopes. But that it had been betrayed was now a known fact. Yet the betrayer was inviolate.

_Chapter Nine_

We have already said that a spy’s main difficulty is not in obtaining information, but in transmitting it safely to the desired point. There is nothing which so completely tries the resourcefulness of the secret agent as the methods he employs in the conveyance of material to his superiors, and without some knowledge of the extraordinary artifices employed by the spies one cannot appreciate the bewildering difficulties that confronted the Second Bureau in their endeavours to intercept incriminating correspondence.

If Mata Hari was engaged in spying, she had the choice of many cunning subterfuges, but a woman living in the full blaze of publicity that attends a vaudeville _artiste_ who courts notoriety, knowing she was under suspicion of the English, but ignorant of the extent of their knowledge, could not hope to keep secret a treasonable correspondence without precautions of an extraordinary nature. The ordinary channels of communication adopted by secret agents were too dangerous to be employed in her case, because the German authorities knew from their own experience that the best of codes can be deciphered by specialists, while chains of agents through whom the information is passed are terribly dangerous, since each link in the chain progressively increases the danger of the betrayal, as was proved in the German _coup_ preceding the Verdun offensive to be mentioned later. Therefore some more than usually safe method had to be devised for communication with Amsterdam and Antwerp.

It was obviously impossible to rely upon the time-honoured methods which were familiar to all secret services alike. Simple invisible inks made from onion or lemon juices were often employed to introduce information into an innocent-looking missive, a simple device which would have spared Nathan Hale’s life had he known of it. One only had to heat the paper to make the writing visible. This old method was very early abandoned in favour of more scientific devices that defied the recognized methods of detection. Since it was necessary to avoid creating any suspicion of the materials used, it became necessary to import them from the agent’s headquarters and it was this form of smuggling which most often revealed a new chemical agent employed for the purpose. Soaps and toilet waters containing ferrate of potassium and lead acetate for the manufacture of invisible inks became part of a spy’s equipment, while handy methods, such as the dipping of a pocket handkerchief saturated with this chemical in a glass of water provided the agent with a means of producing the ink at will.

The writer well recalls the perplexity of a group of counter-espionage agents over a trunk containing nothing but soiled underclothes which had been sent from Amsterdam to a man who had not been in that city for many months. It was the mere fact that all the clothes were soiled that caused the examiners to subject them to a careful scrutiny. Only when a chemical test was applied to every article was it found that one pair of socks was heavily saturated with the material for making enough invisible ink to have supplied a battalion of spies. The remainder of the clothes were unexceptional.

The most amazing craftsman in the use of invisible inks was an Argentine called Dei Pasi, who reported to Gruber in Geneva. Dei Pasi was the typical swarthy spy of the stage romances, with a natural catlike tread and that quick sidelong glance of a man who is instinctively on his guard against the weight of a hand clapped suddenly on his shoulder. His equipment of invisible inks was amazing in its variety and completeness, and yet he was detected only when he sent information concerning the cruiser _Kleber_ through the ordinary mail to Switzerland, written in ordinary ink, and in plain ordinary writing instead of cipher. It is believed that it was this romantic son of the warm south who tried, unsuccessfully, to send a message through a channel which almost deserved a better fate for its originality. He sent the designs of an artillery improvement drawn in the delicate folds of a ballet-dancer’s skirt, but, alas! misfortune too often wears a skirt; it was discovered.

Another favourite means of communicating with superiors in a distant country was by means of small advertisements in the newspapers, but this practice became too dangerous in France, where all such notices had to be submitted to the police before publication, while in England the newspaper staffs developed an extraordinary scent for the suspicious advertisement and voluntarily co-operated with the police in preventing their publication. One spy made use of the “For Sale” column to insert cleverly concealed information relating to the movements of British naval vessels. But if this method had the advantage that when a director of espionage wished to secure secret information all he had to do was to read the enemy newspapers, it had the drawback that intentionally inaccurate information sometimes continued to appear in the usual way long after a spy had withdrawn from the world at large to become the inmate of a prison. The Scotland Yard officials have only recently discarded a motor-car which was purchased from funds received for information supplied in this way. The police had seized the spy Müller and were fortunate enough to have acquired his code book and instructions at the same time. Armed with these documents, the English Intelligence Department continued to furnish the German officials carefully “doctored” information, which so pleased the latter that they increased their spy’s salary. It should be explained on behalf of the London police that they showed their gratitude for this unexpected windfall by purchasing a car and calling it “Müller,” after its unintentional donor.

At the risk of further digression we must here relate an instance of supplying false information to the enemy which is too good to omit. In England, as in Germany, the Intelligence services of the army and the navy are separate departments, only, whereas in Germany the two services fought each other with the dogged perseverance of the proverbial Kilkenny cats, their opposite numbers in London contrived to work with commendable co-operation except in this one case. Sir Reginald Hall, the exceedingly astute head of the Admiralty Intelligence service, once ran across an enemy agent who seemed a likely fellow to snatch greedily at any morsel of confidential information. At this time Sir Reginald wanted very badly to have the enemy misconstrue the meaning of a naval concentration which was in contemplation, so he allowed the watchful spy to receive, in strict confidence, the knowledge that the ships were collecting in order to cover a landing of troops somewhere between the Ems and the Weser.

This threatened violation of their territory came to the ears of the Dutch statesmen, who had to be gently pacified. It also arrived at the Imperial headquarters, where it created genuine alarm. Several reserve divisions were immediately detached from their formations and were moved to meet the menace. Sure enough, this movement of troops was observed and reported upon by the zealous British agents, only in this case the reports went to the War Office and not to the Admiralty.

British military strategists submitted the problem to careful examination and decided that it indicated an intention on the part of the Germans to undertake an invasion of the south coast. They speedily drew up a plan of defence and invited the co-operation of the Admiralty in opposing this threat to the safety of the realm. Enquiries on the matter were naturally addressed to Hall by his superiors and he had to admit that his little plot to deceive the enemy had also succeeded in confusing his friends at the War Office.

Enough has been written to give some idea of the variety of methods at Mata Hari’s disposal if she was contemplating sending information to Amsterdam and to show the manner in which the counter-espionage services were meeting the ever-changing subtlety of the spies. The Second Bureau explored the entire complicated field in order to grasp some incriminating fact. Her influential friends made it positively necessary to have some concrete evidence of her guilt before they could take any steps to even demand the withdrawal of her permission to remain in France, apart from obtaining a conviction before a court-martial, where the evidence submitted would have to be conclusive. If any of her actions were of a suspicious character they could always be explained by the nature of her profession as a light-of-love. But, even admitting that she was spying, how was it possible to continue to send messages to her chiefs when the French agents watched every movement with meticulous care and found nothing damaging? It is notorious that reports were sometimes passed by word of mouth, but the careful scrutiny of all her acquaintances failed to reveal anyone who could be supposed to be receiving and transmitting her messages. It is known that a man called Wecsler was the principal collector of spy’s reports in Paris, but Mata Hari was never known to approach him. In fact, there is good reason to suppose that they did not know of each other’s existence.

In order to appreciate the Second Bureau’s alarm that men of responsible posts should continue to associate with a woman of Mata Hari’s reputation and to follow the logical course of the investigation against her, it is necessary to introduce two more spies, not an unpleasant pair of underworld characters, but two certified scions of noble families. These were Ricardo and Dorlac, father-in-law and son-in-law, who were found to be related to eminent Spanish families; indeed, the older man claimed, we cannot say with what truth, to be closely related to the king of Spain. This precious pair of rascals were enrolled in the German secret service operating from Barcelona.

In Paris they occupied a handsome suite in one of those imposing hotels on the Boulevard Haussmann and frequented the select diplomatic circles, where they were generally recognized as men of standing because of their family associations and because they were travelling on diplomatic passports, acquisitions which afford the bearers many privileges and a freedom from the irritating annoyances which a malevolent bureaucracy invents to distract ordinary travellers. One of the privileges which a diplomatic passport affords its bearer is immunity from, or at least a greatly relaxed severity of, customs inspection.

The elder of the two Spaniards stayed in Paris, collecting materials which would inform his employers on the morale of the people, the movement of troops behind the line, and a variety of matters, while the son-in-law bore the dispatches to Geneva and Barcelona. The pair might have gone on with their work indefinitely had not Dorlac, in returning one time to France, somewhat ostentatiously offered his baggage for inspection by the customs officials. There ensued a slight discussion over the ownership of a box of cigars which Dorlac confidently assured the inspectors did not belong to him. This was not only cowardice, but colossal folly. The box had a false bottom in which was concealed a cipher message of instructions, and rather than run the risk of being found with it in his possession Dorlac allowed it to fall undisputed into the hands of the French.

When he arrived in Paris Dorlac roundly abused his father-in-law for exposing him to danger of arrest with such a childish contraption as a cigar-box with a double bottom for the conveyance of secret documents; it was bound to arouse suspicion, he contended. The angry Dorlac further complained that as he ran the graver risks of the two he was entitled to the larger share of the recompense. As this money matter was the main cause of the argument, it was, naturally, conducted in loud tones, and it was not altogether by chance that a waiter overheard the angry discussion through the thickness of the door, nor was it chance which made him a Spanish-speaking waiter. Ricardo pacified his son-in-law with a promise that he would receive adequate recompense when the next payment was received, and went so far as to recommend the handle of a shaving brush as a good hiding-place for their reports if he was going to submit to customs inspections. This pair of spies can be dismissed with the comment that they had a quick trial and were executed in February of 1917.

The significance of Ricardo and Dorlac in Mata Hari’s case lay in their diplomatic credentials. It gave the first indication that diplomatic privileges might be abused, and it became necessary to “place” men in certain Embassies that were thought to be careless in the manner in which they extended their privileges. As all ordinary mail for foreign countries was delayed for four days and was very closely inspected to see that it carried nothing injurious, ambassadors were not infrequently requested to secure quick delivery or special immunity for important private letters that had no right to the privilege of exemption. A man might wish to expedite an important business letter, or a mother might wish to convey sage counsel to a distant daughter, and occasionally an ambassador would condescend, provided the business man was of sufficient substance or the lady gracious and beautiful enough, to extend his diplomatic protection to the conveyance of his or her mail.

One of the French agents placed in an Embassy was so amazingly successful in his penetration to a position of trust that he got access to the diplomatic mail-pouch. It naturally took some considerable time to reach such a confidential position, but the results obtained proved conclusively that it would have been advantageous to have made the attempt long ago. Nevertheless, as a piece of counter-espionage work, this was an achievement of first magnitude, for, while there have been numerous instances of a spy gaining access to a single diplomatic mail-pouch, this ability to keep an Embassy mail under constant supervision is probably unique in the annals of espionage. It had an astounding outcome.

A few days before the offensive was launched against the Chemin des Dames, Mata Hari quitted Vittel and abandoned the rôle of a penitent to resume her unregenerate life in the capital. One of the first visits she paid after her return to Paris was to the Embassy of the Netherlands, where the French agent was submitting the mail to expert supervision. After a brief interview in an inner sanctum a high official graciously condescended to forward a letter to Mata Hari’s daughter, Jeanne Louise, in Holland; it had been done before and it was done again. Some of these Ministers of foreign powers were willing enough to violate their diplomatic privileges in order to gain the approval of a woman for whose favours they had to compete so keenly. Probably the courteous ambassador imagined that he was morally bound to aid in the transmission to her innocent daughter of wise counsel from a woman who knew the world so well. At least a charitable construction may be placed on the action, for the ambassador was no enemy of France.

But the enterprising agent knew Mata Hari’s reputation at the Second Bureau and he decided to open this letter, have the contents copied, and let the cipher experts work upon its problems. The letter showed how thoroughly Mata Hari had played the part of Delilah in the garments of Magdalene. It carried information of primary importance on a matter of espionage arrangements by which the French were trying to repair the damage caused by a formidable coup delivered by their enemies.

Toward the end of 1915 a wretched traitor had denounced Miss Edith Cavell and some thirty others for conspiring to convey lost Allied soldiers safely over the Dutch border. Among the group arrested were some women agents of the French spy service who had engaged in this other work as they did in anything designed to outwit the German authority. One of the defects in the hastily constructed espionage service in occupied territory was its organization into such a closely welded body where the members were known to one another. It was a fatal defect, although possibly not without its advantages by reason of the opportunities it afforded of mutual aid in the occupied territory. One of the women charged with aiding the concealment of Allied soldiers (they were not tried for spying), through either indiscretion or fear, for the German methods were not distinguished for gentleness, inadvertently betrayed the employment of a number of French agents. At the time the Verdun offensive was in contemplation, and to arrest these betrayed spies at once would doubtless have removed one source of danger, but it would give the French time to learn that their service was paralyzed and set about its repair soon enough to gather information which might destroy the surprise effect of the forthcoming attack. Consequently, the German service held its hand until the particulars of the necessary preparations had to be furnished to the lesser formations, at which time the risk of leakage really began. Then they arrested sixty-six French agents.

It will be recalled that Miss Cavell and her colleagues were executed with a great deal of secrecy. The American and Spanish ambassadors, who were greatly interested in an effort to prevent the commission of the horror, only learned that the death penalty was to be carried out on the eve of its execution, too late to take effective steps at prevention. The reason for this unseemly haste lies in the panic which seized the Germans when they realized that the French service in their territory was so extensive, and the frenzy of fear that urged them to destroy innocent people in the erroneous belief that they were leaders of espionage who might, if allowed to live, convey through those authorized to visit them in gaol a warning that their work was discovered. It proves their lack of actual knowledge of the situation.

The French espionage department was, therefore, deprived of the major part of their service in occupied territory and, while laboriously reconstructing the complex organization, had to depend almost exclusively upon information furnished by the British agents, whose service was unimpaired. Before long it became obvious to the German service that their army zone was being invaded by French agents, but how they arrived and where they came from remained a complete mystery until the day came when one of those strokes of fortune which pass for miracles of police wisdom furnished the solution.

The military governor of Brussels, von Bissing, had fallen victim to a pair of bright eyes that were physically beautiful but morally terrible. Their owner, best known in Brussels as Angèle, was generally supposed to have set too rapid a pace for her elderly admirer to maintain, so that he died of an overdose of ambition to be youthful and to indulge in the follies of youth. His death made the girl’s situation somewhat precarious, for she had lived under von Bissing’s protection in more ways than one. Finding that her growing popularity thrust her into a good deal of notoriety, which angered the patriotic civilians who declined to lighten the life of the invaders, she decided to confide her past to her new friends, the Germans, as a means of securing her future safety from malicious gossip or actual denunciation. The girl told how she had originally fled from Brussels at the approach of the German invasion, but had been induced to return to it in order to act as an English spy. The perplexed German officers who heard this confession wanted to know how she had penetrated their lines. She explained that she had been dropped from an airplane. This revelation released a flood of light upon the obscure problem which was puzzling the Intelligence department as to how the Allies were introducing spies behind their lines.

It will be readily understood that if the French or British could find anyone courageous enough to make the hazardous leap from an airplane into the abyss of night, it was comparatively easy for that person to find many willing protectors among the loyal civilian population of the occupied territory who could furnish concealment and assistance. It was surprising how many gallant French and Belgian men (and women, too,) were willing to make this perilous drop into the bowl of night and through an “Archie” barrage in order to serve their country. And let it be said to their eternal honour that none could have been tempted by the pecuniary reward, for the mere pittance they received for the task was a trifle compared to the financial magnates’ salary paid the men who make spectacular parachute jumps for the benefit of the curious at the present day.

The practice of landing spies from airplanes is, I believe, an American invention, having been introduced by Lieutenant Bert Hall, an American aviator employed by the Turks in the first Balkan War. At the time of the formation of the Lafayette Escadrille, of which he was one of the original members, this remarkable soldier of fortune (he is now said to be a general in the Chinese army) was already experienced in the dangerous science. Dark nights, the darker the better, were the chosen times for these daring exploits. The locale selected for a landing-place was some isolated spot where a resident spy was already stationed. If the coast was clear the resident agent showed a light up his chimney and the pilot would then land his passenger. After the lapse of an agreed time, say two weeks, the pilot would return to the neighbourhood and, if the arranged-for light was showing, would make a descent, pick up his spy, and carry him back.

This method had the great advantage that the spy’s absence was of such short duration that there was no necessity for the always dangerous written communications by which a spy is so frequently exposed. In this case he had simply to memorize his information so that in case of seizure there were no incriminating documents to conceal.

But when the Germans found that the occupied territory was being sown with enemy agents, they were not long in inventing a means of locating their landing-places. They placed sound-ranging sets tuned to pick up the vibration of motors near likely spots and, after a landing had been effected, there was a comparison of results which revealed the exact spot where the descent had taken place and a careful watch was then kept for the pilot’s return. This compelled the adoption of parachutes for landings, which were thereafter accomplished without sound.

The task required a steady nerve at that stage of airplane experimentation and when parachutes were usually associated with the genial lunatic who leaped from a stationary balloon to thrill the loutish spectators at a country fair. Yet there were one or two hardy souls who not only made the perilous leap, but who made their way back to repeat the performance. There were not a few whose experience could not be passed on for the benefit of their followers, for they were engulfed in that great silence which enclosed the fate of the “missing.”

To find these courageous guests from the midnight air, once they had landed, was a task beyond the ability of the distracted German Intelligence service. Their only hope was to learn where the pilots dropped their passengers for the aerie descent, and to concentrate vigilance upon that locality. But, if they ever took any living survivor of these exploits, none was persuaded to impart this much-needed information to his captors, who, therefore, had to devise some other expedient to obtain the knowledge. The evil grew to such dimensions that, finally, the phenomenal success of Mata Hari in Paris induced her superiors to allot to her the delicate task of ascertaining from the pilots themselves what routes they took and at what spots they took leave of, and picked up, their passengers. It was a job after her own heart.

This explains her fondness, apart from her already expressed preference for men of the officer class, for the airmen who came to Paris on leave and for the same class of men whom she lured into intoxication and intimacy during her alleged mission of mercy in Vittel. From their unguarded lips she learned the babbled truth which cost many of the tellers their lives before the routes could be changed for this risky work.

Before the astonished Second Bureau had recovered from the shock of their discovery that Mata Hari had adopted this unique channel of communication for her treacherous correspondence and had resolved upon a course of action, the offensive had been launched against the Chemin des Dames, only to be received with a devastating fire that showed only too well that the intention had been conveyed to the enemy, who was expecting it, but as yet there was nothing to suggest that they could do more than accuse Mata Hari in their minds.

Then like a bolt from the blue came the terrible truth. Within a few days of the unveiling of her betrayal of the pilots and agents a letter was received at the Embassy for Mata Hari.

This was not a reply from her innocent young daughter, but a request to pursue a matter previously mentioned and an expression of thanks for the information about the attack on the Chemin des Dames, for which she would receive payment as soon as its reliability had been proved.

“While at Vittel ... I intended to abandon my life of debauchery and to consecrate myself to the devoted care of this man ... the only man I ever really loved.”

All the melting softness of her nature must have run into Mata Hari’s tender glance as she spoke those words, for the rest of her being was as hard as flint, particularly her heart.

How many of the 80,000 dead, 100,000 wounded, and 20,000 missing had tasted the bitter sweet of her Delilah kisses will never be known, but that they were many will be recalled by the survivors who have not yet forgotten how generously she dispensed hospitality and how liberally she loved.

It would now appear that the spy had run her course, that the Second Bureau, implacable in its hate for this detestable business, would immediately proceed with her prosecution as a spy. But here Mata Hari had them utterly defeated. With all their knowledge of her treachery, the French authorities were absolutely powerless to lay a finger upon her.

_Chapter Ten_

There are few measures of policy on which any general measure of agreement may be expected of the corps of ambassadors in any national capital, but there is one which instantly draws them together into an articulate unanimity, and that is any threat against their common diplomatic privileges. These privileges are guarded so jealously that any breach is regarded almost as gravely as a violation of territory. Consequently, when it was found that one amiable but indiscreet diplomat had suffered his diplomatic mail-pouch to be used as the means of conveying a treasonable correspondence against the security of the nation to whom he was credited there was much impotent indignation among the French officials. But they had to proceed with the greatest delicacy. It would never do to expose the indiscreet diplomat, because that would alienate the sympathy of others who might feel that they were being submitted to the same undignified suspicion and were having their correspondence examined by spies. While all were not so treated, some were.

Again, these were dark days in France. A Ministerial crisis was imminent upon the question of national security; mutiny had broken out in a portion of the army; as a result of the venomous campaign of enemy agents working upon a war-weary and discouraged populace, revolution was threatening to raise its grisly features in the streets of French cities; and, quick to sense this state of internal weakness, some neutral countries whose friendship for the Allies had never been very demonstrative were ready to provoke a quarrel in order to range themselves on the side of the apparently victorious Central Powers, and were only restrained by the wisdom of a few men armed with the power to hold in check those of their countrymen who listened for inspiration to the indefatigable German agents. To precipitate a hostile declaration or even to embitter relations with one of these neutral states might be the turning-point in the war against the Allies. A revival of confidence in the leaders of French opinion and a successful military campaign were alike necessary before the French could openly proclaim the application of a high-handed policy over the abuse of diplomatic privileges.

Therefore, Mata Hari was allowed to retain her freedom and to continue her treacherous activity, secure from molestation by the French authorities until she committed some blunder. The only consolation was that, with a little luck, they could continue to learn what military secrets she unearthed by maintaining the supervision of her correspondence.

With her work at Vittel accomplished, Mata Hari was free to enjoy the more congenial atmosphere of the capital, having renounced her intention of surrendering what she admitted was a life of debauchery in order to consecrate herself to the care of her one true lover. It would seem that she was incapable of denying herself any sensual pleasure. Being in Paris with the gratifying feeling of having accomplished safely a piece of difficult and dangerous espionage, she plunged whole-heartedly into the old life with a gusto stimulated by denial. Whatever luxuries could be provided in the capital were procured to replace the substitutes she had been forced to endure in half-starved Vittel. She reappeared on the stage, to the admiration of the officers on leave and the Parisians who sought distraction from the accumulation of troubles that threatened their entire happiness; in a few houses, wealthy old bachelors whose selfish profligacy overcame their fears for the national safety, continued to dispense a furtive hospitality which was incomplete without the central figure of the entrancing _bayadère_, with or without her veils. Vittel must have seemed very remote and poor Captain Marov completely forgotten in the mad whirl of pleasure which so soon engulfed her.

However, her stay in the French capital was of short duration. She departed this time on what seemed a perfectly legitimate journey, for she had a well-advertised dancing engagement to fulfil in the Spanish capital. There was a repetition of her former triumphs in this engagement, for she was so favourably received that her visit was extended. During this stay in Madrid, Mata Hari was lionized by the artistic groups among whom she had already many friends, but the artists did not monopolize her time. Conspicuous among her friends at this time were Lieutenants von Kalle and von Kroon, the naval and military _attachés_ at the German Embassy and known to be the heads of their respective Intelligence departments in that country.

All during the summer of 1915 the agents of France and Britain were reporting to Paris and London that most of Mata Hari’s time was spent in the company of these two officers and that one time she had paid a hasty visit to Barcelona, where she went directly to the headquarters of the German secret service in that city and returned without apparently having visited anyone else. They further reported that she was talking of paying a visit to Holland early in the next year.

Before embarking for this visit, however, Mata Hari returned to Paris and resumed her old life, which had been interrupted by the Madrid engagement. She made no public appearances at the Paris music-halls but she continued to frequent the dens of midnight revelry where officers went to pass the feverish hours of liberty granted by a few short days of leave in Paris. The officers of the Second Bureau were anxious to learn what line of investigation she was now following in accordance with the secret instructions hinted at in the first intercepted message from Holland, but her activities were so cleverly conducted that no hint of her purpose escaped the secrecy surrounding her. Then came a ray of hope for the much harassed officials of the Second Bureau. In January of 1916 Mata Hari left France after having announced her intention of returning to her home in Holland. There seemed little doubt in their minds that this was merely an opportunity to consult with her employers, but, on the other hand, there did not appear much likelihood that Mata Hari would attempt to return to the scene of her successful spying, so that Paris would be well rid of an undesirable guest. No obstacles were placed in the way of her departure. But her passing was signalled to the British.

Accordingly, when the boat in which Mata Hari was travelling touched at Falmouth, the police ordered her to accompany them to London for examination as a dangerous person. The chief of Scotland Yard at that time was Sir Basil Thomson, who has left an account of the interviews in his book of reminiscences. Thomson admits that he was impressed by the intelligence the spy displayed in her answers to his questions and her quick repartee. He was not impressed, however, by her beauty, which, he says, had begun to fade (she was then forty and had lived through ten dissipated years which must have left their mark on her features), and she was growing plump.

Thomson did not mince matters in the two interviews he had with her. In fact, he quite frankly accused her of carrying on a correspondence with the enemy. This Mata Hari denied as an absurdity, only to be confronted with the names of the various German agents with whom she had spent so much of her time while in Madrid. Instead of being at all disconcerted by this revelation of his knowledge of her actions, Mata Hari merely expressed astonishment, assuring him that she had no idea von Kalle and von Kroon were engaged in Intelligence work; she knew them as _attachés_ at the Legation, but not as the chiefs of the German secret service in Spain.

This first interview ended in a stalemate. A painstaking search of the actress’ baggage was no more profitable. There appeared no reason why Mata Hari’s departure for Holland should be further delayed. The cause of the delay and the reason why the interview was resumed lie in a fact upon which Thomson retains a discreet silence.

The President of the Council in Holland had written to the head of Scotland Yard begging him to obtain Mata Hari’s deportation. There was no secret about the Dutch premier’s infatuation for the dancer; that was a piece of scandal which no longer excited surprised comment. But it is uncommon for a statesman to request a friendly nation to deport his lover. There can be little doubt that Van der Linden foresaw her tragic end if she persisted in such dangerous employment, and he feared that the redoubtable Scotland Yard authorities might penetrate her secret unless he could get her home without delay.

Therefore, Sir Basil Thomson decided to have one more attempt to extract some admission from his captive and, if he failed, then to allow her to proceed to Holland with a caution, thereby performing a humane action by liberating a known spy and at the same time do a small favor to the Dutch premier, which might be added to the Allies’ credit balance, then at a low ebb in certain quarters in Holland.

The second interview had a curious termination. The examination was even more severe than the first, but, while it failed to extract any of the knowledge of her activities that Thomson wanted, it did at last induce Mata Hari to admit that she was a spy. But not for Germany. She was, she said, employed by the French. This was a piece of sheer stupidity, for the dancer should at least have known that the French had enough difficulty in watching their enemies to have any desire to spy upon their friends. In any event, the risk she ran by lying was great because all Thomson had to do was to ask the French military mission in London to verify this statement.

Of course, we know now that Thomson was under no misapprehension, for he had been forewarned of Mata Hari’s journey by the French. But he had failed to obtain orthodox evidence which would have enabled him to lay the case before a British court with any hope of securing a conviction. He told her, therefore, that as she had done no injury to his country he would permit her to depart for Holland. He added a piece of friendly counsel which the dancer would have done well to heed. He advised her not to leave Holland during the war and solemnly warned her against trying to visit either Germany or France. Probably profoundly relieved at the prospect of release from this very embarrassing situation, Mata Hari said:

“Sir, I thank you from my heart. What I have been doing I will do no more. You may trust me implicitly.”

So Mata Hari was allowed to step out of the frying-pan _and_ the fire. But she ignored both Thomson’s warning and her own promise. Apparently she did not know that the British agents in Holland and Germany were warned to be on the lookout for her, and that the chief of the English counter-espionage service was kept informed of her movements.

Almost immediately upon her arrival in Amsterdam, Mata Hari paid a visit to the tobacco shop kept by Max Neuder. This establishment was already under the close surveillance of the Allies’ agents, for it was known to be a “letter-box” for numerous German agents. The postal censors knew that they had a prize each time they intercepted a letter addressed to the innocent-looking tobacco shop. Mata Hari’s visits to this place were promptly reported to headquarters in London and in Paris, thus confirming further the existing suspicion against her.

At the time of the dancer’s return to her home, the German authorities had become exasperated by the audacious exploits of an English agent who defied their best efforts at detection. When, finally, they received an awe-inspiring rebuke from the All Highest for a particularly impudent performance by this spy, it was decided to call in the aid of Mata Hari, to whom the man was believed to be known.

In order to appreciate the situation which faced the dancer one must have at least a glimpse of her opponent.

The fame of “Mr. C.” is already known to those American secret agents whose work lay along naval lines. Few people either in his own country or abroad knew that this symbol covered the identity of an English army captain called Reilly, who was the Admiralty’s “ace” in espionage. Reilly had an extraordinary faculty for acquiring a perfect knowledge of languages and for impersonating exactly the type of people whose language he was speaking. To this he added the advantages of his Irish ancestors’ quickness of thought, fertile imagination, readiness of tongue, and unbounded courage. He knew several European countries better than he knew his own.

Reilly’s most astounding _coup_ against the Germans reads like a romance. It has rarely been equalled, and only excelled by his own later exploits in Russia.

An order had been sent to German army headquarters to send a responsible officer to receive instructions on naval policy from the Emperor. The man chosen was an unknown junior officer, for the staff had their own ideas concerning responsibility. However, he displayed considerable intelligence and a broad knowledge of naval and military matters during the explanation of the new submarine policy which was laid before him. He requested amplification of indefinite points, clarity in place of some obscurities, and a detailed instruction upon the army’s co-operation to produce the desired political effect. His alertness and zeal so impressed the seniors that they were convinced that their policy would not be misinterpreted at army headquarters, and the Emperor was so struck by the amiable young officer that he invited him to lunch.

The visitor to the Kaiser’s luncheon table was “Mr. C.” the British Admiralty agent.

Reilly exhibited the signs of a master-craftsman in this performance. He displayed a technique that shows how profoundly he studied the men against whom he was working. It was not so well known then as now, that the German headquarters staff frequently courted disaster in employing young and inexperienced officers upon tasks that are usually delegated to more experienced men. The classic example is that recounted in von Kluck’s memoirs, where a visiting colonel from the staff overrode this army commander’s orders and ignored the general plan for the invasion of Belgium in order to impose his own ideas upon the handling of the situation.

Reilly’s close study of the men he was watching must have acquainted him with this peculiarity of the staff. How he should have known who was entrusted with the mission I do not pretend to know, but it will look less like a miracle when the reader knows that during many months of the war one of Prince Rupprecht’s staff majors was a British agent, and that he contrived to keep his employers well furnished with information in spite of the vigilant observation of other men who were jealous of his influence with their commander and who sought his downfall in order to occupy his place.

How Reilly contrived to waylay or kidnap his victim in order to impersonate him remains a mystery, and will probably continue to do so, for the files of the British secret service are well nigh inaccessible.

Nor is it known how long it was before the German authorities realized they had been duped. Their side of the question is no less enshrouded in silence that is likely to remain impenetrable, unless one of the actors should choose to speak. But before dismissing Captain Reilly to make way for Mata Hari, space might be found for mention of another sensational _coup_.

After the war he was sent to Russia, where he struck up an acquaintance with Trotsky, then Commissioner of War, who introduced him to Lenin. The leader of the revolution speedily recognized that Reilly’s great knowledge of Europe made him a decided acquisition in the Foreign Office. It was while acting as an official in this department that the British agent saw a letter which he judged would be of interest to his employers. This was the famous Zinovief letter which was instrumental in wrecking MacDonald’s first labour government in England.

But the Russian secret police had come to suspect him during an absence from his post in connection with the disposal of this document. The G. P. U. have an unenviable reputation as a power for vengeance. When Reilly was travelling back to Russia, their secret agents picked up his trail in Berlin and accompanied the train to the frontier. No sooner was the frontier line passed than these agents took Reilly off the train and, without even the apology of a trial, riddled his body with bullets.

Such, then, was the man whom Mata Hari was called upon to expose. Her choice in the search depended entirely upon her acquaintance with the agent who was supposed to be operating. Her meeting with this agent antedated the war and took place in a Balkan town. Mata Hari had been instructed at that time to scrape up an acquaintance with the man who was believed to be in possession of some exceedingly valuable knowledge much envied by the Germans. Knowing that he was an old Indian army officer, Mata Hari thought that her imaginary Hindu origin might serve as a suitable basis of common interest. She approached the British agent, therefore, and said to him:

“Have we not met before? Ah yes. In India, was it not?”

“More likely in Berlin,” was the uncompromising retort, which should have warned Mata Hari that the British were fully aware of her activities long before war broke out.

However, this lesson never seems to have been completely mastered by Mata Hari, and as she was most probably too vain to report these snubs to her employers, they were unable to warn her that they were portents of danger. But her efforts to locate the man who was causing so much uneasiness at Fräulein Lesser’s headquarters proved completely unavailing, and after having employed herself about the usual haunts of Intelligence agents in Amsterdam and Antwerp, the dancer spent some little time in Germany, where she had no professional engagements to fulfil.

It would be an insult to the undoubted intelligence of the chiefs of the German secret service to suppose that they entertained any great hope of success that Mata Hari would have their intended victim surrendered to her by some chance encounter. They were much too wise to be so sanguine of fate’s friendly assistance, and much too subtle to admit a limit to their resources. They planned a _coup_ which was intended to relieve them of much anxiety on the score of Belgian spies.

The information concerning the dropping of enemy agents behind their lines must have been exceedingly welcome to the German Intelligence staff, for they were enduring much annoyance from the existence of an efficient and well-organized counter-espionage service in addition to the extending activity of energetic spies. The amount of spying and counter-spying which went on in Belgium must have been phenomenal. The Allies had the assistance of practically every Belgian in the occupied territory who possessed the necessary hardihood and who was capable of responding to the claims of patriotism. This patriotic motive placed the invading army under a severe handicap, since the best minds were thus employed against them, either actively in espionage or passively in the resistance of their own agents.

But the famous Stieber (and Fouché before him) had found that felons and crooks, if poor material for spies, made excellent counter-spies. Thus, while occupying France and Belgium, the Germans organized regular gaol deliveries of every convict who would undertake the malodorous work of treachery in return for his liberty. These hired renegades proved of incalculable value in the famous sweep which resulted in the seizure of the sixty-six French agents. The most notorious of them, Armand Jeannes, boasted that he had betrayed no fewer than one hundred and twenty-six of his fellow countrymen and women.

Every class of Belgian was engaged in the task of outwitting their invading hosts. Simple peasants did what they could, educated men like the Judge Lacroix accomplished infinitely more because they occupied influential positions, and cultured women like Louise de Bettignies achieved marvels of deception.

Louise de Bettignies deserves special mention because her refinement seemed to render her singularly unfitted for the rough and active work of organizing a corps of spies to operate in British interests. Yet this girl, and others like her, developed a resource, a courage, and a fortitude of which many men could justifiably be proud. One day, while somewhat of an amateur at the business, Louise was trying to cross the frontier into Holland without the necessary papers, when she was overtaken by a patrol. Her message was so ill-concealed that exposure must certainly follow capture, and the prospect of death before a firing party did not appeal to Louise. She preferred to risk another form of calamity. Somehow or other she had to cross a wire fence which was charged with 14,000 volts of electric current. In her flight from the advancing patrol the girl had scrambled to the top of the roof of a stable and, seeing that she had been observed, she took a flying leap which barely carried her over the sinister barrier into safety.