Von Papen had, of course, communicated to Berlin an account of our various activities, and there was little that I could add to the information the department possessed about conditions in the United States. Mexico seemed rather the chief point of interest, and Major Kohnemann, to whom I spoke, asked innumerable questions about the attitude of Villa towards both the United States and Germany; what I thought of his chances of ultimate success, and whether I believed that he, if he succeeded, would be more friendly to Germany than Carranza was at the time. After an hour of such discussion, which more closely resembled a cross-examination, he suddenly rose.
"Your information is of great interest, Captain von der Goltz," he said. "I shall ask you to return here at five o'clock this evening. Wear your heaviest underclothing. You are going to see the Emperor."
I started. Prussian officers do not joke as a rule, but for the life of me I could not see any sane connection between his last two remarks. The major must have noticed my perplexity, for he smiled as he continued:
"You are going to travel by Zeppelin," he explained. "It will be very cold."
That night I drove by motor to a point on the outskirts of the city, where a Zeppelin was moored. It was one of those which had formerly been fitted up for passenger service, and was now used when quick transportation of a small number of men was necessary. There were several officers of the General Staff whose immediate presence at Coblenz, where the Emperor had stationed himself, was needed; and since speed was essential we were to travel in this way.
The miles lying between Berlin and Coblenz seemed but so many rods to me, as I sat in the saloon of the great airship, resting and talking to my fellow-passengers. One would have thought that we had been travelling but a few moments when suddenly there loomed below us in the moonlight the twin fortresses of Ehrenbreitstein and Coblenz, each built upon a high plateau. Between them, in the valley, the lights of the city shone dimly; in the centre of the town was the Schloss, where the Emperor awaited us.
But I did not see the Emperor that night. Instead, I was shown to a room in the castle a room lighted by candle and there my attendant bade me good night.
At half-past three I was awakened by a knock at the door. "Please dress," said a voice. "His Majesty wishes to see you at four o'clock."
It was still dark when at four o'clock I entered that room on the ground floor of the castle where the Emperor of Emperors worked and ate and slept. In the dim light I saw him, bent over a table on which was piled correspondence of all kinds. He did not seem to have heard me enter the room, and as he continued to work, signing paper after paper with great rapidity, I looked down and noticed that, in my haste to appear before him on time, I had dressed completely save for one thing. I was in my stocking feet.
I coughed to announce my presence. He looked up then, and I saw that he wore a Litewka, that undress military jacket which is used by soldiers for stable duty, and which German officers wear sometimes in their homes. But the face that met mine startled me almost out of my composure; for it was more like the countenance of Pancho Villa than that of Wilhelm Hohenzollern. That face, as a rule so majestic in its expression, was drawn and lined; his hair was disarranged and showed numerous bald patches* which it ordinarily covered. And his moustache for so many years the target of friend and foe which was always pointed so arrogantly upwards, drooped down and gave him a dispirited look which I had never seen him wear before.
In a word, it was an extremely nervous and not a stolid Teutonic person who sat before me in that room. And it was not an assertive, but merely a very tired human being who finally addressed me.
"I am sorry to have been obliged to call you at this hour," he said, "but I am very busy, and it is important that I should see you."
And then, instead of ordering me to report to him, instead of commanding me to tell him those things which I had been sent to tell him, this autocrat, this so-called man of iron, spoke to me as one man to another, almost as a friend speaks to a friend.
I do not remember all that we spoke of in that half-hour the three years that have passed have brought me too much of experience for me to recall clearly more than the general tenor of our conversation. It is his manner that I remember most vividly, and the general impression of the scene. For as I stood before him then, it suddenly seemed to me that he spoke and looked as a man will who is confronted by a problem that for the moment has staggered him not because of its immensity, but because he sees now that he has always misunderstood it.
Here, I thought, is a man accustomed to facing all issues with grand words and a show of arrogance; and now at a time when oratory is of no avail, he finds himself still indomitable, perhaps, but a trifle lost, a trifle baffled, when he contemplates the work before him. For Wilhelm II. had laboured for years to prevent, or if that were impossible, to come victoriously through, the crisis which he knew must some day develop, and which he himself had at last precipitated. He had striven constantly to entrench Germany in a position that would command the world; and had sought to concentrate, so far as may be, the trouble spots of the world into one or two, to the end that Germany, when the time came, might extinguish them at a blow. But the time had come, and he knew that, despite his efforts, there were not two, but many issues that must be faced, and each one separately. He had striven with a sort of perverted altruism to prepare the world for those things which he believed to be right and which, therefore, must prevail. And now after long years of preparation, of diplomatic intrigue with its record of nations bribed, threatened, or cajoled into submission or alliance, he was faced with a condition which gave the lie to his expectations, and he knew that "failure "must be written across the years. Russia and Japan were for the moment lost; Italy was making ready to cut itself loose from that alliance which had been so insecurely founded upon mistrust. And in America who could tell? And yet for all that I read weariness and bewilderment in his every tone, I could find in him no trace of hesitation or uncertainty. Instead, I knew that running through every fibre of the man there was an unquestioning assurance of victory a victory that must come!
While I stood there imagining these things, he spoke of our aims in Europe and in America and of the things that must be done to bring them to success. He bade me tell him the various details of our affairs in Mexico and the United States; and he, like Kohnemann, was chiefly interested in Mexico. It was, in fact, almost suspicious, his interest was so great; and I could explain it only in one way that he viewed Mexico as the ultimate battlefield of Japan and the United States in the next great struggle the struggle for the mastery of the Pacific. For just as Belgium has been the battlefield of Europe, so must Mexico be the battleground of America in that war which the future seems to be preparing.
I remember wondering, as he spoke of what might come to pass, at the tremendous familiarity he displayed with the points of view of the peoples and Governments of both Americas. I had thought myself well acquainted with conditions in both continents; but here was a man separated by thousands of miles from the peoples of whom he talked, whose knowledge was, nevertheless, more correct, as I saw it, than that of anyone Dernburg not excepted whom I had met.
It was then, I think, that he told me what Germany wished of me, outlining briefly those things which he thought I could do best.
"You can serve us," he said, "in Turkey or in America. In the one you will have an opportunity to fight as thousands of your countrymen are fighting. In the other, you will have chosen a task that is not so pleasant, perhaps, and not less dangerous, but which will always be regarded honourably by your Emperor, because it is work that must be done. Which do you choose?
I hesitated a moment.
"It shall be as your Majesty wishes," I said finally.
He looked at me closely before he spoke again. "It is America, then."
And then, as I bowed in acquiescence, he spoke once more for the last time so far as my ears are concerned.
"I must be ready by 7; my train leaves at 7.10. I may never see you again, but I shall always know that you have done your duty. Good-bye!"
And so I left him--this man who is a menace to his people, not because he is vicious or from any criminal intent; not, I believe, because his personal ambitions are such that his country must bleed to satisfy them; but merely because his mind is the outcome of a system and an education so divorced from fact that he could not see the evil of his own position if it were explained to him.