What if England defied this sabre-rattling of Germany, and declared war to protect Belgium? He pondered as he stood there, glancing down into the leafy avenue where the people were shouting, “À bas les Allemands!”
He had his back turned to his friend, who still sat smoking. Had he turned, he might, however, have seen something which would have aroused wonder within him, for while he stood there, looking down upon the straight, leafy way, bright under its lines of lamps, his friend, behind his back, had clenched his fists fiercely. Arnaud Rigaux’s teeth were set, and upon his countenance was a fierce look of hatred of the man whom he was trying to lull into a false sense of security.
A distinctly evil expression played about the corners of his sensuous mouth, as his narrow-set eyes glinted with the fire of a detestation which, until that moment, he had so cleverly concealed.
Though posing as an intensely patriotic Belgian, he was, if the truth be told, one of the few men in Brussels who knew the German intentions, and who, for a fortnight past, had been fully prepared.
War must come, he was well aware. It had all been arranged two years ago, yet the Belgian Government, and even the Baron de Neuville, its chief financial adviser, had remained in utter ignorance. They had never suspected the Kaiser’s treachery.
Rigaux smiled as he reflected how cleverly the secret of it all had been kept. Great Britain must now certainly fall into the trap so cunningly prepared for her, and then Europe would, as the Kaiser intended, be drenched in blood.
In those moments, while the Baron stood outside, he reflected upon the private audience he had had with the Emperor at Potsdam nine months before, of the secret reports he had furnished regarding the financial situation of Belgium, and other matters, and the preparations for war in Luxembourg and along the frontier, which were revealed to him by a high official in the Wilhelmstrasse. He had returned from his “business-visit” to Berlin, and not a soul in Brussels had ever dreamed that he had been received by the Most Highest. The secret policy of the Kaiser was to court the good-will of certain financiers who, most of them, willingly became his agents and cats’-paws, and kept the War Office in Berlin well informed of the trend of events. It was so in the case of the clever, wealthy, and unscrupulous Arnaud Rigaux.
The Baron turned, but in an instant the face of his friend reassumed its expression of easy-going carelessness.
“This silly war-scare seems to please the people—eh?” he laughed aloud. “Hark at them shouting! It is to be hoped they will not attack the German Legation, burn the German flag, or commit some ridiculous outrage of that sort.”
“Let’s hope not, or it might be misconstrued into an act of war,” the Baron agreed, as he stepped again into the small, cosy, but exquisitely furnished room. “Probably the Garde Civile have taken every precaution to avoid demonstrations. Nevertheless,” he added, “I do not like the outlook at all, my dear Arnaud. I confess I do not like it at all.”