MASTER SPIES

Waikato Times, Volume 105, Issue 17711, 15 May 1929, Page 4

MASTER SPIES

(By JOSEPH GOLLOMB, Author of “Master MaD Hunters.”!

SYNOPSIS OF PARTS I. AND 11. It was in Silesia that Stieber, a youth of 20, made his appearance just after graduating from law school. Stieber's genius was for spying. He became a factory hand in the great Schoffel iron works, achieved leadership in their councils which planned revolt against Frederick William, King of Prussia, and then betrayed the workers to the King. Stieber organised for the King a modernised and specialised organisation adapted to a general service of security, both of the interior and the exterior of the nation, enjoying autonomy under his leadership.

So efficient was his interior system that some of the most exclusive doors were opened to him and his wife more or less graciously, lest Stieber open sundry closets with family skeletone therein. The task of Stieber's “exterior” espionage was to make a preliminary survey to enable Prussia to crush more easily the smaller kingdoms around it. One by one they fell and the power of Prussia grew.

Then the growing Germany turned its eyes towards France. Stieber undertook to “survey" it as he had Bohemia. He accompanied Bismarck on a State visit when Napoleon 111., Frederick and Alexander 11. of Russia met at Paris.. Napoleon 111. sought an alliance with the Czar, which Bismarck hoped to prevent. Stieger discovers a Polish plot to assassinate the Czar and allows the assassin to fire, but sees that the shot goes wide. Ger • many has saved the Czar’s life from a murderer in the French capital.

In prison the young Pole made his statement.

“I wdshed to avenge Poland. It is useless to question mo farther. I have no accomplices. And I accept full responsibility." lie was tried by a jury of none too prosperous citizens. There is no actual proof existent that the prosperity which a number of the jurors experienced -soon after the trial was illegitimate. But the young Pole was acquitted on the ground of “extenuating circumstances."

Which so incensed Alexander 11. that lie drew' back from the alliance Napoleon 111. sought. And Prussia, thereby the gainer, was ready to proceed against France. This time Stieber did not set out alone, as lie had for Bohemia. First he summoned his two lieutenants, Zernlcki and Kaltenbach. Stieber had two aspects to him as a spy. One was that of the glib good mixer, the actor of many guises, suave, sly, a reader and manipulator of men. The other side of him was tho calculating machine; casting up humtin needs and human lives as ooldbloodedly as if they were so many numerals and ciphers. Each of his two lieutenants represented one of these two aspects; Zernlcki, a Pole, was the mixer; Kaltenbach tho calculator. In Bohemia Stieber had been a “peddler." . Now in France It was as a personago of means that he travelled; he was a “Greek capitalist” looking about for an outlet for spare millions; and there must have been many Frenohmen who knew Striebtir, the chief of Bismarck’s Secret Service, but did not recognise the “ Greek capitalist." And, like shadows, whereever he went were Zernlcki and Kaltenbach, sometimes in his wake; often preceedlng him; sometimes by his side; occasionally at a distance; the precursors of the great shadow to be cast over Franco. A Curious Army.

When the three returned to Berlin they began recruiting an army. It was a curious army. First were enlisted over a hundred pretty girls. The moral character of each girl was looked into. If she was likely to bo handicapped by considerations of modesty or chastity sho was rejected. These girls were quietly distributed In garrison towns In the eastern part of France to serve as barmaids and purveyors of pleasure to French soldiers.

The order given them was to see that their customers had plenty to drink and in return to get from them all the information the girls could weedle. The second line of recruits was 1,000 German women of somewhat higher calibre. These, too, were distributed throughout Eastern France as chambermaids in hotels where French officers and personages of importance were in the habit of stopping. Some were helped to secure places as servants to French families of the great middle class, in the homes of lawyers, editors, business men, doctors and civil servants of the higher rank. Then several thousand German farmhands were sent to France, and many a French farmer thought himself lucky to get such competent labour at harvest time. But—- “ These German ploughboys arc surely a sober lot," ran the amused comment among the pleasure-loving French

“When he has a little spare time my Fritz" —with a Gallic smile and shrug—“instead of going to the inn or meeting a girl, he takes a walk along the road to this or that place, or along the canal, or he goes off to brood by himself on the railroad bridge. Seems to be more interested in geography than in women. Stupid, isn’t he?" A Highly Seleot Corps. A more highly select corps went next, frock-coated young men who were given a short but intensive course in secretarial w’ork. Some of the courses in their curriculum would have made their future employers uneasy. These young men were taught how to open sealed envelopes and to seal them again so that no one would detect they had been tampered with. They were taught to take wax impressions of keys; to imitate handwriting, particularly signatures; to detach seals from documents and replace them with others. Then they were sent to France and helped to find employment. Most of the young men were university graduates, had discreet manners, showed marked intelligence, ani dressed well. As their French was excellent, and as they were modest in the salaries they asked, it Is not surprising they found excellent situations with Frenchmen in public life.

All these men and women drifted into France singly, quietly, and each one found his or her appointed place without, arousing suspicion. How efficiently this invasion was manoeuvred is shown by tho fact that by 1870 there were something like 35,000 of Stiebcr's army strategically distributed between the Prussian border and Paris. And still the French little suspected its presence, Meanwhile to captain these thousands several hundred retired German officers were sent to France to establish themsclvo3 in business, as book’ dealers, provision, merchants, dealers

NO. 6—CHIEF TO 40,000 SPIES.

in optical goods, and the like. Each o£ these was what is known in the parlance of modern spy systems as a “letter box.” That means that centrally located in a territory marked off as a spy district was a man with whom subordinate spies regularly deposited written reports. To these subordinates in turn tho "letter box” handed down instructions he received from his territorial chief. Such chiefs were established in Paris, Lyons, Marseilles, Lille, Bordeaux, Valenciennes, Strasburg; at St. Gyr; Saumur, Bourges, Fontainebleau, St. Etienne, Tulle, Le Creusot and other places. These territorial chiefs in turn reported to and were instructed by superiors, one in Geneva, another in Brussels, a third in Lausanne, and a fourth immediately under the eye of Stiebcr in Berlin. Delicate Business. These “district inspectors” were forbidden to enter France; forbidden by Stieber. He trusted none but himself, Zernicki and Kaltenbach with the delicate business of inspecting the secret army that had already overrun France.

The Napoleon of spies and his two litculcnanls —Zernicki disguised as a Swede in pursuit of pleasure; Kaltenbach as a Dutch engineer—covered their territory with Teutonia method and thoroughness. First Sticbcr would arrive at some town at which one of his “letter boxes” was established. Here he took a bird’s-eye view of the situation and issued general instructions for that district. Then he went on lo tho next. In his wake at a stated interval followed Zernicki and Kaltenbach. Both saw to It that their chief’s general Instructions had been executed in detail, and each drew up a report with such minuteness that Stlober, to whom it was forwarded at the next stop, knew to a chambermaid or a canteen girl .what share each ol’ tils spies contributed to the Information that Was being gathered. With each visit went praise or blaino to tho incumbent. Salaries were raised, trebled, quadrupled or cut. But with each doubling of salary went a trebling of tho work. It is a tribute to the gift Zernicki had of smoothing the ruffled feelings of subordinates that not a single one of that army grumbled loudly enough for the French to hear.

Finally, with 1650 reports from his various “letter boxes," Stieber and his lieutenants returned to Berlin. Tho Prussian army chiefs, with von Moltke at the head, went to work to digest the reports. What von Moltke said of Stiebcr’s single-handed “survey of Bohemia” lie subscribed to even more heartily now that lie had read his reports. Ho said so to Bismarck. The Chancellor asked his spy—“Do you need any more money? Men? Women?”

An Army Entrenched. “No, Excellence, I have enough. My army Is entrenched on French soil. It awaits only the coming of your troops.” On the basis of Stieber's detailed voluminous report Field Marshal von Moltke formulated his plan for the invasion of France. And exactly eighteen months later Bismarck gave the xvord for war. Von Moltke was asleep when the news was brought him that war had been declared between Prussia and Franco. He said to an officer—“Go to tho flies and take out Folio No. 1 and follow instructions therein." Then ho turned over and wont to sleep again, leaving it to his subordinates to start tho vast machinery of war into action. Like clockwork all over Prussia barracks and arsenals woke to life. Horses wheeled into plaoo, Tarpaulins were whisked off and cannon rolled ponderously in tho direction of Franco. The country resounded to the tramp of armies on the march. And only too soon that grim rhythm crossed over into France.

And along with Bismarck and von Moltke came Stieber and his two lieutenants. The Iron Chancellor and his army rolled over the Invaded land with the crushing power of a steam roller on a road that had been prepared for it. Village after village, town after town, one city after another, strove in vain lo resist the advance. But the enemy knew too much, and many a defence, apparently undermined beforehand, crumbled at the first onslaught by the enemy.

And as the Prussian troops marched into each town practically the same thing happened. The population would see some peasant seized, handcuffed, often flogged, and taken to headquarters, where it seemed likely he would com’c in for still worse treatment unless lie supplied the information exacted of him. Up-to-the-minute Reports,

Invariably the information was forthcoming, an up-to-the-minute report of the disposition of French troops and what food and war material were available for the invader.

But once closeted with the Prussian inquisitors the “peasant” made his report without thd least coercion. For while the beating he had received in public was genuine the need for it was not, except to fool the French. Meanwhile through the town chalked crosses and other symbols mysteriously appeared on various doors. One mark meant suitable quarters for officers; another that provisions were hidden there by the French; a third showed where horses could be stabled; a fourlii how many soldiers the house could accommodate.

Hastily the French threw their armies together and tried to stem the advance. But battle after battle went to the Prusisans. Meanwhile Stieber was in his clement. The machine he had set up on French soil had paved the way with a success indeed machinelike. And now', like some motor-driven harvester of to-day, it was delivering its sheaves of information to the General Staff, information that worked as much havoc as if Stieber's forty thousand were armed with guns an'd cannon.

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