Notwithstanding my long training in the most tortuous paths of secret intrigue, I was fairly taken aback by this announcement.
‘That telegram!’ I could only exclaim. ‘The one which your Majesty addressed to President Kruger!’
‘I never sent it,’ Wilhelm II. declared gravely. ‘It is a forgery pure and simple.’
For a moment I sat still in my chair, almost unable to think.
‘But what——? But who——?’ I articulated, struggling with my bewilderment.
‘That is what you have got to find out for me,’ was the answer. ‘Let me tell you all I know. The first intimation I had of the existence of such a thing was the sight of it in the Press. I sent instantly for the Chancellor, who came here wearing a reproachful expression, and evidently prepared to complain bitterly of my having taken such a step without previously informing him. When I told him that the whole thing was an impudent fabrication, he could scarcely believe his ears. In fact, for some time I believe he was inclined to consider my repudiation of it as a mere official denial.’
I ventured to raise my eyes to his Majesty’s as I observed—
‘Your Majesty has taken no steps to make your repudiation public?’
The Kaiser gave an angry frown.
‘That is the serious part of the affair,’ he answered. ‘Kruger, in his eagerness to proclaim to the world that I was on his side, had sent copies of this infamous production to every newspaper in the two hemispheres before it reached my eyes. At the moment when I first saw it, it had already been read and commented upon all round the globe. The British newspapers were already threatening war, and my own people had been excited to a pitch of enthusiasm such as no other act of mine has ever called forth. You see the position I was placed in. If I were now to disavow this forgery, my disavowal would be received everywhere with the same scepticism as was felt even by my own Chancellor. The British would triumph over me, and my own subjects would never forgive me for what they would regard as a surrender to British threats.’