CHAPTER XXXIV
THE FAMILY STATUTE
My task is done. At last the reader knows all that ever will be known – all there is to know, in short – concerning the tragedy of the North Sea.
My personal adventures can possess little interest after the all-important transactions I have had to describe. But in case there should be a reader here and there who is good enough to feel any curiosity as to my fate, I will briefly tell what followed on my arrest.
My revolver was taken from me and I was conducted under a strict guard back to Kiel.
Off the mouth of the Canal we were boarded by a despatch-boat flying the German naval ensign, and a police officer with three men took me off the submarine.
The first proceeding of my new captor was to handcuff me. He then warned me,
“If you speak a single word to me or any one else till you are in the imperial presence, my orders are to shoot you through the head.”
I nodded. I had as little wish to speak as the Emperor could have to let me. My thoughts were busy with the memory of the woman of whose tragic death I had been the unwitting cause, and with the measures that remained to be taken to extenuate, so far as extenuation was possible, the fatal action of the Baltic fleet.
As for myself, I can say truly that I had become almost indifferent to what was in store for me. My feeling toward the unfortunate Princess had not been such as that which makes a man desire a woman for his wife; it had not deserved the name of love, perhaps; and it was certainly free from any taint of a less noble passion.
Nevertheless it had been a powerful sentiment, colored and strengthened by my knowledge of her love for me.
Sophia had loved me. She had saved my life. And I had taken hers in return.
Must I accuse myself of weakness for feeling as if happiness for me were over, and the best fate I could wish would be to lie there beside my victim on the lonely Dogger sands?
When I came before Wilhelm II. he was not in the Hall of the Hohenzollerns, indulging his vein of extravagant romance, but in his private cabinet and in his most stern and business-like mood.
“Give the prisoner a chair, and wait outside,” his majesty commanded briefly.
I sat down, still handcuffed, and the guards withdrew.
“Now,” said the Kaiser, fixing me with an eagle glance, “be good enough to explain your proceedings.”
I met his look with a steadfast one in return.
“I have carried out your majesty’s orders scrupulously. I have taken out the submarine torpedo boat, engaged a crew, proceeded to the Dogger Bank, and drawn the fire of the Baltic Fleet on the fishing-boats from Hull. I have not seen a newspaper since, but I assume that the British Navy has already arrested Admiral Rojestvensky and his squadron, and that the two Powers are at war.”
The Kaiser gnawed his moustache.
“Things have not gone quite so well as you pretend, M. Petrovitch.
“The Russian cannonade ceased after a few minutes,” the Emperor resumed. “You did not remain on the surface after the first shot; you did not launch your torpedo, neither did you permit the other submarine to do so. In fact you sunk her.”
“I had no orders with respect to another submarine, sire. I was entitled to treat it as an enemy.”
“Nonsense, you know that it had left Kiel before you, on the same errand.”
“On the contrary, sire, I could not possibly know anything of the kind.”
“Why, you saw it had disappeared from the dock. You inquired after it along the Canal. When you got out to the Dogger you were searching for it the whole time.”
“And when I found it, sire, it was leading the Russian squadron, of which it appeared to form part. I had every right to assume that it was a Russian man-of-war.”
“A German boat!” thundered the Kaiser.
“A boat not flying any flag must be presumed to belong to the country of those who are in control of it. I found this submarine under the control of a Russian subject.”
“The Princess was my agent.”
“Your majesty had not told me so. On the contrary, I understood that you wished my own boat to be considered a Russian vessel, in case of any question. I shipped a Russian crew therefore.”
Wilhelm II. frowned angrily.
“Do not play with me, M. Petrovitch. I know all about your crew. Explain why you, a Russian subject, should have attacked what you are pleased to pretend was a Russian ship.”
“I regret to have to say that your majesty is laboring under a mistake. I am not a Russian subject.”
This time the Kaiser was fairly taken aback.
“What subject are you?”
“A Japanese.”
Wilhelm looked thunderstruck.
“Japanese!” was all he could say.
“If your majesty pleases. That being so, as soon as I took possession of the submarine, with your permission, of course it became a Japanese ship.”
“What you tell me is monstrous – ridiculous. Your name is Russian, your face is at least European.”
“My name, sire, is Matsukata. I received it in Tokio at the commencement of the war, on being adopted into a Japanese family.
“If your majesty doubts my statement, I ask to be confronted with the Japanese Ambassador in Berlin.”
The Kaiser looked as if he would have liked to doubt it, but found himself unable to do so.
“Then on your own showing you are a Japanese spy,” he pronounced slowly. “As such I am entitled to have you shot.”
“Pardon me again, sire. In Petersburg I admit, that was my character. In Germany I have been your majesty’s agent, and have literally fulfilled your commands.”
“You are a very acute quibbler, I see,” was the retort, “but quibbles will not save you. You have stolen one of my ships to sink another with, and at the very least you deserve to be hanged as a pirate.”
“I demand to be tried,” I said boldly, knowing that this was the one step to which the Emperor, for his own sake, could not consent.
As I expected, he frowned uneasily.
“In this case I must exercise my right of refusing a civil trial, in the interest of the State. I will give you a court-martial with closed doors.”
“That would be illegal, sire.”
“You dare to tell me so!”
“Your majesty will find I am right. The case falls within the Hohenzollern Family Statute.”
The Kaiser appeared stupefied.
“The Family Statute?” he repeated slowly, as if unable to believe his ears. “What has the Statute to do with you?”
“It is provided in the Statute, if I recollect rightly, sire, that a member of the Imperial Family can be tried only by his peers, that is to say, by a court composed of members of your majesty’s House.”
“Well, and what then?”
“By another clause in the Statute – I regret that the number has escaped my memory – the privileges of a Hohenzollern in that respect are extended to members of other reigning Houses.”
“What are you going to tell me?” Wilhelm II. demanded in amazement.
“Only that I have the honor to be the adopted son of his imperial highness Prince Yorimo, cousin to his majesty the Emperor of Japan.”
The German monarch sat still, unable to parry this unexpected blow.
“The Japanese Ambassador – ” he began to mutter.
“Will confirm my statement, sire. I have already asked to be confronted with him. Before going to Kiel, I sent him information of my plans, so that he is already expecting to hear from me, I have no doubt.”
Wilhelm II. saw that he had come to the end of his tether. Lying back in his chair, he ejaculated —
“I believed there was only one man in the two hemispheres who could do things like this!”
“I am flattered to think you may be right, sire,” I responded in my natural voice, with a smile.
The Emperor bounded from his seat.
“You – are – Monsieur V – !” he fairly gasped out.
“I was, sire. Permit me to repeat that I am now called Prince Matsukata of Japan.”
Wilhelm II. made an effort, and came out of it with his best manner.
“Then, in that case, you will stay and lunch with the Empress and myself, my dear Prince.”
As soon as the handcuffs had been removed, I told the whole story to the Kaiser, who was immensely interested, and decidedly touched by the part which related to the drowned Princess.
Before leaving the Palace, I asked permission of my imperial host to make use of his private wire for a message to London, in the interest of peace.
Wilhelm II., who began to see that he had been betrayed into going a little farther than was altogether desirable, consented in the friendliest spirit, merely stipulating that he should be allowed to see the message.
He was rather surprised when he found it was addressed to Lord Bedale at Buckingham Palace, and comprised a single word, “Elsinore.”
And so, although some of the newspapers in the two capitals of England and Russia continued to breathe war for some days longer, I felt no more anxiety after reading the paragraph which stated that the British Prime Minister, at the close of the decisive Cabinet Council, had driven to the Palace to be received in private audience by her majesty Queen Alexandra.
EPILOGUE
As I write these lines the war which has cost so many brave lives, and carried so much desolation through the fields and cities of Manchuria is still raging.
The great fleet of Admiral Rojestvensky, from which the stains of the innocent fisherman’s blood have not yet been washed, is plowing its way to meet a terrible retribution at the hands of the victorious Togo.3 A curse is on that fleet, and it may be that the British Government foresaw that they could punish the crime of the Dogger Bank more terribly by letting it proceed, than by bringing it into Portsmouth to await the result of the international trial.
In the great affairs of nations it is not always wise to exact strict justice, or to expose the actual truth.
I, too, am a lover of peace. Not of that hysterical, sentimental horror of bloodshed which would place a great civilized nation at the mercy of more barbarous powers, which would stay the wheels of progress, and be indistinguishable from cowardice in the face of wrong.
But I am a friend of the peace which is the natural result of a better understanding between peoples, of respect for one another’s character and aims, of a wise recognition of facts, and an honorable determination not to play the part of the aggressor.
It is in the hope of promoting such a peace on earth, and such good-will toward men, that I have allowed myself to publish the foregoing narrative.
In order to soften the character of this revelation I have endeavored to impart to it a character of romance.
So far as my abilities extend, I have sought to give the reader the impression that he has been reading an allegory rather than a dry, business record. I have tried to cover certain incidents with a discreet veil. I have as much as possible refrained from using real names.
I trust that my narration will be accepted in the spirit in which it has been written and that no reader will allow his feelings of curiosity to lead him into going further, or raising questions which it might be indiscreet on my part to answer.
But there is one part of the story to which the foregoing remarks do not apply.
Whatever else be mythical, there is nothing mythical about the bright figure whose portrait has accompanied me through so many perils. There is a home for me in far-off Tokio, and when the blood-begrimed battalions of Asia sheathe their swords, I shall go thither to claim my reward.