A week later, that is to say, on the 8th of February, 1904, I was in Tokio.

The behavior of the Princess Y—— on hearing of the death of her victim had been a strange mixture of heartlessness and hysterical remorse.

At the first sound of the fatal shots, she came rushing to the scene of the tragedy, and cast herself on the floor of the corridor beside the dead man, seizing his hands, crying his name aloud, and weeping frantically.

When I tried to raise her, so that the body might be removed, she turned on me fiercely.

“This is your fault!” she cried. “Who are you, and how dared you interfere with me?”

“As you see by my uniform, I am an inspector of police attached to the Third Section.”

She gazed at me searchingly for a moment, and then, lowering her voice, and bringing her lips to my ear, she said with intense energy:

“It is a lie. I am here by the orders of the Minister himself, as you must know well. You are acting against us, whoever you are.”

“I am acting by order of the Czar,” I responded.

She smiled scornfully.

“I expect that is another lie. You could not have got so far as you have unless you had some one else behind you. Poor Nicholas!—Every one knows what he is, and that he has less power than any other man in Russia. Are you Witte’s man, I wonder?”

“You are a bold woman to question me,” I said. “How do you know that I am not going to arrest you for stealing and destroying the Czar’s letter?”

“I should not remain long under arrest,” was the significant answer. She gave me another searching look, and muttered to herself, “If I did not know that he was safe in the hands of my friends in Petersburg I should think you must be a certain Monsieur ——”

She broke off without pronouncing my name, and turned away.

At Mukden, the next stopping place, the Princess Y—— left the train, no doubt intending to travel back to Russia and report her success.

In the meantime, I had reason to think she had notified her friends in Manchuria to keep an eye on me.

All the way to Dalny I felt by that instinct which becomes second nature to a man of my profession that I was under surveillance. I detected a change in the manner of my friend the train superintendent. My trifling luggage was carefully searched. In the night when I was asleep some one went through my pockets. I was able to see that even the contents of my cigarette case, which I had not opened since leaving Petersburg, had been turned out and put back again.

As the train neared Dalny I began to feel a little nervous. I had a dread of being stopped on my way to embark on board the steampacket which was still running to Tokio.

The train drew up at last, at the end of its five-thousand-mile-run, and I stepped off it to the platform, carrying my valise in my hand.

The platform was literally swarming with spies, as it was easy for a man of my experience to detect. I walked calmly through them to the cab-stand, and hailed a droshky.

The driver, before starting off, exchanged a signal almost openly with a stout man in plain clothes, who dogged me from the railway carriage.

Presently I sighted the steamer, alongside the principal wharf, with the smoke pouring out of its funnel, all ready to start.

The cabman whipped his horse and drove straight past the steamer.

“Where are you going?” I shouted.

“To the Custom House first; it is the regulation,” was the answer.

Taking out my long neglected case, I placed a cigarette between my lips, and asked the driver for some matches.

He passed me a wooden box. I struck several, but each went out in the high wind before igniting the tobacco.

I was making another attempt as the droshky drew up outside the steps of the Custom House. I dismounted negligently, while one of the officials came and clutched my luggage. Then I walked slowly up the steps, pausing in the porch to strike a fresh match.

A porter snatched the box from my hand. “Smoking is forbidden,” he said roughly. “Wait till you are out again.”

I shrugged my shoulders, pinched the burning end of the cigarette, which I retained in my mouth, and sauntered with an air of supreme indifference after the man who was carrying my bag.

He led me into a room in which a severe-looking official was seated at a desk.

“Your papers,” he demanded.

I produced the papers with which I had been furnished by Rostoy.

The customs official scrutinized them, evidently in the hope of discovering some flaw.

“On what business are you going to Tokio?” he demanded.

I smiled.

“Since when have the police of the Third Section been obliged to render an account of themselves to the officers of the customs?” I asked defiantly.

“How do I know that you are not a Japanese spy?”

I laughed heartily.

“You must be mad. How do I know that you are not a Nihilist?” I retorted.

The customs officer turned pale. I saw that my chance shot had gone home. The Russian imperial services are honeycombed by revolutionary intrigues.

“Well, I shall detain your luggage for examination,” he declared.

This time I pretended the greatest agitation. Of course, the more I resisted the more he insisted. In the end he allowed me to depart without my person being searched. The fact is I had convinced him that he held an important prize in my worthless valise.

I was just in time to catch the steamer. As I crossed the gangway, a man dressed like a coal-trimmer turned on me a last careful scrutiny, and remarked,

“Your cigarette has gone out, Mister.”

“Can you give me a light? Thank you!” I struck a match, drew a puff of smoke, and handed him back the box. Then I walked on board, the gangway was drawn in, and the Japanese steamer headed out to the open sea.

On reaching Tokio I experienced some difficulty in obtaining an audience of the Japanese ruler.

I was obliged to announce my name. It will hardly be believed, but the chamberlain whom I had entrusted with the important secret, brought back the answer that the Mikado had never heard of me!

“Tell his imperial majesty that there is no monarch of Europe, and only two of Asia, who could say the same. I am here as the confidential plenipotentiary of the Czar, with an autograph letter addressed to the Mikado, and I respectfully ask leave to present it in person.”

Such a demand of course could not be refused. But even now the haughty Japanese did not receive me in the privacy of his own cabinet. On the contrary, I found myself introduced into the State Council-Room, in which his majesty was seated at a table surrounded by his chief advisers.

In particular I remarked the venerable Yamagata, conqueror of China, and the round bullet-head of Oyama, the future overthrower of Kuropatkin.

On the table was spread out a large map, or rather plan, of the entire theater of war, including Manchuria, Korea, Japan and the seas between. A man in naval uniform was standing beside the imperial chair, with an expectant look on his face.

All eyes were turned upon me at my entrance. The Mikado beckoned to me to approach him.

“Is it true that you bring me a letter from the Russian Emperor?” he asked abruptly. “We have received information that such a letter was on its way, but that the bearer was murdered on the Manchurian railway four days ago.”

“Your majesty’s information is substantially correct,” I answered. “The messenger, a Colonel Menken, was seduced into parting with his despatch, and committed suicide in consequence.”

“Well, and what about yourself?”

“Foreseeing that the unscrupulous men who have been trying to force on a war between his Russian majesty and your majesty would leave no stone unturned to intercept this despatch, the Czar wrote a duplicate with his own hand, which he entrusted to me, in the hope that I might baffle the conspirators.”

“Where is it?”

“I endeavored to conceal it by unstitching the front of the shirt I am wearing, and sewing it up between the folds.

“Unfortunately I was drugged at a dinner party in Petersburg just before starting. I was unconscious for an hour and a half, and I fear that the opponents of peace have taken advantage of the opportunity to find and rob me of the letter. But I will see, with your majesty’s permission.”

The Mikado made no answer. Amid a breathless silence, with all the room watching my movements, I tore open my shirt-front and extracted a paper.

It was blank.

“So,” commented the Japanese Emperor, sternly, “you have no such credentials as you boasted of having.”

“Pardon me, sire. Anticipating that the War Party would suspect the object of my mission, and would resort to some such step to defeat it, I purposely provided them with a document to steal, believing that when they had robbed me of it they would allow me to proceed unmolested. My real credentials are here.”

I drew out my cigarette case, found the partially smoked cigarette I had had in my mouth when I ran the gauntlet of the spies at Dalny, and proceeded to cut off the paper. On the inner surface these words were written in the hand of the Czar:

The bearer of this, M. V——, has my full confidence, and is authorized to settle conditions of peace.

Nicholas.