CHAPTER XXIII.

THE WORK OF A SECRET AGENT.

“It seems to be your pleasure to speak in enigmas, colonel,” said the detective.

“In enigmas? How so, sir?” was the reply.

“You speak of certain important papers which are of untold value, and announce that one-half of those papers have disappeared; as if the papers were a melon, or an apple that one might cut into two parts—dividing them equally. Be good enough to explain what you mean.”

“Ah; I made the announcement just as it came to me; but I did not intend to puzzle you, Mr. Carter.”

“Well?”

“Perhaps it will be the pleasure of the ambassador, when you talk with him, to explain to you exactly what those papers are; but I have not permission to do so. In fact I am not entirely informed upon the subject myself. I know only so much about them as it was necessary for me to know, to carry out my part of the work.”

“I understand.”

“Let me endeavor to explain in this way: His majesty, the czar, is interested in accomplishing a certain purpose that is well defined in his own mind, and in the minds of his counselors, which relates to another government—not the United States. You understand that, Mr. Carter?”

“I think so.”

“I was instructed to assure you that you would not be asked to do anything that you could not conscientiously perform as a loyal citizen of the United States.”

“Very well. Go on.”

“The ambassador whom I represent was directed to carry on the secret work of that affair, and to direct it from his embassy, in Washington. He has done so. In carrying on the work a mass of documents has collected. They are entirely apart from his regular official duties as ambassador to the United States.”

“I already understand that, sir.”

“Among those documents which have collected, there are certain papers which, if placed upon this table in one package, might be contained in a rubber band, and might be deposited within the space contained in your greatcoat pocket. As I have stated, those documents—those to which I am referring just now—are of vast importance.”

“I think I am sufficiently well assured of that, colonel.”

“As a means of safety, these papers were not only written in cipher, but they were then redrawn, in halves, and the originals were destroyed. They were drawn up and written in such a manner that neither half of them could be deciphered without the other half. Do you follow me?”

“Perfectly.”

“Those two halves, each necessary to the other half, were concealed, hidden away for safe-keeping, by the ambassador in person, in places known only to himself supposedly; in localities widely different. Understand that they were not yet complete, or they would have been forwarded to St. Petersburg before now. That is what was to be done with them as soon as they were completed.”

“Yes.”

“They would, each half by itself, have been sent to St. Petersburg—and by entirely different routes. For example, I might have been dispatched there with one-half of them in my charge, ignorant of what I carried with me, save only that they were documents of importance to be delivered exactly as directed.”

“Yes.”

“I might have been sent with them by way of China; the other half might have been sent direct by another person. Each of us would have known nothing of the other one. Understand?”

“Yes. But what has that to do with their disappearance?”

“I am merely endeavoring to impress upon you the care with which they were guarded, and would have been guarded to the end.”

“Very well. I understand that.”

“The documents were nearly complete, but not quite so. There remained one matter of importance to be accomplished, before the documents were forwarded, as I have described, to St. Petersburg.”

“Yes.”

“Well, sir, one of the halves of those prepared documents has disappeared from the place where the package was concealed. The ambassador instructed me to tell you that, so far as he is aware, no person other than himself knew where either of those packages was concealed. He wishes to have you go to Washington, to consult with him on the matter without delay, and he desires to impose entire secrecy concerning the affair upon you.”

“Is that all?”

“That, Mr. Carter, is the purport of my mission here. I was to tell you that much. I could not tell you more than that, for the reason that my own knowledge goes no farther. Whatever else there is to be told to you, the ambassador will tell you in person.”

“You have no idea where the papers were concealed, colonel?”

“Beyond the surmise that they were somewhere within the embassy, I have not even an idea concerning them; and even that much is only a surmise.”

“Colonel Alexis Turnieff, in a matter of this kind, one has to ask plain questions—so plain that they are sometimes offensive,” said the detective, fixing his eyes upon the face of the man before him.

“Yes, sir. I can understand the necessity for that. I am not thin-skinned, Mr. Carter. If your statement in any manner applies to me, I will say that you are at liberty to put any questions to me that occur to you. But I must assure you again that I have absolutely no knowledge as to the contents of those papers.”

“But you do know that name of the government, other than the Russian government, that they concerned; eh?”

“Yes; although I am not at liberty to tell you that. The ambassador——”

“I don’t care to know it at the present time. What I do want to know—and this is one of the questions which might be offensive; particularly if you are entirely loyal to your chief—is this: Could the ambassador serve his own purposes, personal or otherwise, by making it appear that those papers had disappeared when in reality they had not done so?”

“Do you mean, would he steal them himself?” demanded Turnieff, in amazement.

“Words to that effect; yes.”

“Impossible!”

“Now, if you had discovered where one of those packages was concealed—in making use of the pronoun, I refer not alone to yourself in person, but to every other member of the official household of the ambassador—would it have advantaged you or any other person within that household to have abstracted one of those packages?”

“I cannot conceive how it would have done so, Mr. Carter.”

“I do not mean that papers so taken would necessarily be used, or passed on to other persons; but would it have been to the interest of any person of your knowledge to repress those papers?”

“The question, Mr. Carter, is beyond me. Remember, I am utterly ignorant of their contents.”

“But knowing the country besides your own that they concern, you, being in the diplomatic service, could make a shrewd guess regarding the purport of them, could you not?”

“No. Really, Mr. Carter, I could not. I have known enough about what has been going on, to have drawn conclusions several times; conclusions which I thought at the time were quite satisfactory, but which inevitably have proven to be entirely and utterly erroneous.”

“How long a time have those papers been in preparation?”

“I do not know.”

“How long a time have you been attached to the embassy at Washington?”

“Two years; rather more than that.”

“They have been in preparation since you have been there?”

“Yes.”

“And before that time?”

“I have reason to suppose so.”

“Who would be chiefly interested in stealing papers of the sort you suppose them to be, colonel?”

“Ah; now you ask me a question which I can answer. Not directly; I don’t mean that; but in a general way.”

“Well?”

“I am only young in the service, Mr. Carter, but I have been sufficiently long engaged in it to know that whenever there is a diplomatic movement on foot, inimical to another country or government, the government which it threatens is pretty apt to have an inkling of the matter, or at least a suspicion.”

“Yes. I should suppose so.”

“We will say, then, that this affair threatens the government of Siam—which is preposterous, of course; I suggest it only by way of illustration.”

“Yes.”

“If the government of Siam were one of the first or second rate powers, it would have diplomatic representatives at every capital in the world. It would have secret agents all over the world. You understand that?”

“I do.”

“Now, if it suspected that Russia was plotting some antagonistic move, it would watch Russia, not alone at St. Petersburg, but all over the world. It would consider carefully who the man might be in the diplomatic service of Russia, who would be most likely to be given the operation of such a delicate affair, and who could be entirely trusted with it; who possessed the brain capacity to carry it out; who was in every way competent.”

“I understand you. Well?”

“Suppose that in such a case Siam decided that the ambassador to the United States was that man. Siam would at once dispatch a horde of secret agents to this country. Some of them would be Siamese, but the majority of them would be of other nationalities. They would belong to that class which become international spies through choice, and have little care what governments they serve; who go from the service of one to the service of another as readily as you or I would change our clothing.”

“And it is your opinion, then, that Siam—we will keep up the fiction for the moment—has many secret agents in Washington now, and that one of them has managed to get his hands on those papers.”

“Or her hands; yes. That is the idea.”

“I understand you. Now—could one of those secret agents for the other power, by any possibility, become a member of the official family of your ambassador?”

“Why not, Mr. Carter?”