Chapter I: Preface

My readers will be divided between those who think that I have not told enough, that I have told too much, and that I had better have told nothing at all. I bow my head to them all.

The list of those to whom my thanks are due is too long to set out in a preface. It would include the names of my admirable staff, of sailors, soldiers, and civilians of many countries besides our own in almost every walk of life and even of a few of our late enemies. No drama, no film story yet written has been so enthralling as our daily repertory on the dimly-lighted stage set in a corner of the granite building in Westminster. In a century after we, with our war-weariness, are dead and gone the Great War will be a quarry for tales of adventure, of high endeavour, and of splendid achievement: when that time comes even some of the humbler actors who play their part in these pages may be seen through a haze of romance.

My thanks are due to Mr. Milward R. K. Burge for permission to use his verses on the Hôtel Majestic during the Peace Conference.

B. T.

LONDON, 1922.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER I
PAGE

THE DETECTIVE IN REAL LIFE 1

CHAPTER II

THE IMAGINATIVE LIAR 10

CHAPTER III

THE LURE OF SOMETHING FOR NOTHING 22

CHAPTER IV

THE FIRST DAYS 33

CHAPTER V

THE SPECIAL BRANCH 47

CHAPTER VI

WAR CRIMES 62

CHAPTER VII

THE GERMANS AND THE IRISH 75

CHAPTER VIII

THE CASEMENT CASE 86

CHAPTER IX

STRANGE SIDE SHOWS 97

CHAPTER X

THE GERMAN SPY 117

CHAPTER XI

MÜLLER AND OTHERS 130

CHAPTER XII

THE HIRELING SPY 144

CHAPTER XIII

THE LAST EXECUTIONS 155

CHAPTER XIV

SOME AMERICANS 174

CHAPTER XV

WOMEN SPIES 181

CHAPTER XVI

CURIOUS VISITORS 192

CHAPTER XVII

THE END OF RASPUTIN 204

CHAPTER XVIII

RECRUITS FOR THE ENEMY 213

CHAPTER XIX

THE DECLINE OF MORALE 225

CHAPTER XX

THE BOGUS PRINCESS 236

CHAPTER XXI

FOOTNOTES TO THE PEACE CONFERENCE 246

CHAPTER XXII

THE ROYAL UNEMPLOYED 252

CHAPTER XXIII

UNREST AT HOME 262

CHAPTER XXIV

OUR COMMUNISTS 279

CHAPTER XXV

THE RETURN TO SANITY 303