“In our hearts we real Americans know it. But we had no leader—nobody of faith, conviction, vision, action, to do what was the only thing to do. No; we had only talkers to face the supreme crisis of the world—only the shallow noise of words was heard in answer to God’s own summons warning all mankind that hell’s deluge was at hand.”
The intense bitterness of what he said had made her very grave. She listened silently, intent on his every expression. And when he ended with a gesture of hopelessness and disgust, she sat gazing at him out of her lovely dark eyes, deep in reflection.
“Garry,” she said at length, “do you know anything about the European systems of intelligence?”
“No—only what I read in novels.”
“Do you know that America, to-day, is fairly crawling with German spies?”
“I suppose there are some here.”
“There are a hundred thousand paid German spies within an hour’s journey of this city.”
He looked up incredulously.
“Let me tell you,” she said, “how it is arranged here. The German Ambassador is the master spy in America. Under his immediate supervision are the so-called diplomatic agents—the personnel of the embassy 178 and members of the consular service. These people do not class themselves as agents or as spies; they are the directors of spies and agents.
“Agents gather information from spies who perform the direct work of investigating. Spies usually work alone and report, through local agents, to consular or diplomatic agents. And these, in turn, report to the Ambassador, who reports to Berlin.