Chapter Nine.
The Kaiser’s Secret Agent.
“The position is a very grave one, Henri,” Rigaux explained when, a few minutes later, they were alone together in a small, circular, book-lined room, that room below one of the high round towers of the château, which the Baron used as a bureau. “I hesitated to speak very openly before your wife, because it would cause her undue alarm. There is no doubt—indeed, there has been abundant proof in these last four days—that Belgium swarms with German spies. They are everywhere. Our enemies have been most crafty and cunning in their preparations for our undoing. They have arrested and shot sixteen German agents in Antwerp alone. They had carrier-pigeons, secret wireless, code-books, German ammunition, secret stores of petrol, and other things, which showed, only too plainly, their intentions. Now your telephone was cut at noon to-day, was it not, and you are wondering? Well, the truth is that the Germans occupied Brussels at eleven o’clock this morning?”
“They are in Brussels!” gasped the Baron, starting up. “You must be joking!”
“I am not, I regret to say. To-day, at eleven, Burgomaster Max met the German commander in the Chausée de Louvain. There was no resistance, and the enemy marched into the city, doing the goose-step as they passed the Gare du Nord.”
“Impossible?” gasped de Neuville, pale as death.
“But it is the unfortunate truth. The Germans are asking for an indemnity of eight millions sterling. The Minister of finance has asked me to negotiate the loan. Will you and your friends take part in it?”
For a moment the Baron de Neuville was silent. He knew the financial straits of the Government at that moment, and he was reflecting.
At last he said, in a low, earnest voice: