‘No, she will leave us to do that. Russia has discovered that her conquests advance better under the cloak of peace. She means to take Norway under cover of a declaration in favour of Norwegian independence.’
‘But the Norwegians—are they mad enough to become parties to that? Do they want to exchange King Log for King Stork?’
‘Go and see,’ was King Oscar’s reply.
I quitted his Majesty’s presence, and returned to my hotel, deeply disturbed by what I had heard. I could not suppose that the most sagacious sovereign in Europe was indulging in idle fears. Yet it was hard to believe that the inhabitants of a free, self-governing country would voluntarily exchange their condition for servitude to the Asiatic despotism which had just laid Finland prostrate at their door.
Three days afterwards I arrived in Christiania. I had made careful preparations for the task before me. I assumed the character of a Russian spy, as the least likely to provoke suspicion of the quarter from which I really came. And I had disguised my person as effectively as I knew how, lest I should meet a real agent of the Tsar’s Government, who might detect A—— V—— beneath the outward semblance of Alexander Volkuski.
The pains I had taken were well rewarded. In the hotel in which I put up I found staying a man who passed as a Finnish officer, of Swedish nationality, but whom I immediately recognised as Count Marloff, the confidential right-hand man of M. de Witte himself. It is true the Russian was disguised, and the disguise was a very good one, but by an almost incredible oversight he had ventured to assume that a disguise which had already done duty once might safely be used again.
It was seven years before, in Teheran, that I had seen that reddish wig and noted that peculiar limp, but if Count Marloff had offered me his card I could not have been more sure of his identity. Such mistakes may be pardonable in a mere detective, but they are fatal in our profession.
My tactics were soon decided on. I knew that the attention of ‘Colonel Sigersen’ would be quickly attracted to a Russian staying in Christiania, and I have generally found the boldest game to be the most successful.
I seized the first opportunity of the Count’s being seated alone in the smoking-room of the hotel, to go up to him boldly.
‘How do you do, Count?’ I said in Russian. ‘Or perhaps you will wish me to say “Colonel”?’