The Great War in England in 1897 Part 31

Although the French Commander-in-chief had been killed, yet the enemy still fought on tenaciously, holding their ground on Leith Hill and through Pasture Wood to Wotton and Abinger, until at length, when the saffron streak in the sky heralded another blazing day, the straggling, exhausted remnant of the once-powerful legions of France and Russia, perspiring, dust-covered, and bloodstained, finding they stood alone, and that the whole of Suss.e.x and Surrey had been swept and their comrades slaughtered, laid down their arms and eventually surrendered.

After these three breathless days of butchery and bloodshed England was at last victorious!

In this final struggle for Britain's freedom the invader had been crushed and his power broken; for, thanks to our gallant citizen soldiers, the enemy that had for weeks overrun our smiling land like packs of hungry wolves, wantonly burning our homes and ma.s.sacring the innocent and unprotected, had at length met with their well-merited deserts, and now lay spread over the miles of pastures, cornfields, and forests, stark, cold, and dead.

Britain had at last vanquished the two powerful nations that had sought by ingenious conspiracy to accomplish her downfall.

Thousands of her brave sons had, alas! fallen while fighting under the British flag. Many of the princ.i.p.al streets of her gigantic capital were only parallel lines of gaunt, blackened ruins, and many of her finest cities lay wrecked, shattered, and desolate; yet this terrible ordeal had happily not weakened her power one iota, nor had she been ousted from her proud position as chief among the mighty Empires of the world.

Three days after the great and decisive battle of Caterham, the British troops, with their compatriots from the Cape, Australia, Canada, and India, entered London triumphantly, bringing with them some thousands of French and Russian prisoners. In the streets, as, ragged and dusty, Britain's defenders pa.s.sed through on their way to a great Open-Air Thanksgiving Service in Hyde Park, there were scenes of the wildest enthusiasm. With heartfelt grat.i.tude, the people, scrambling over the debris heaped each side of the streets, cheered themselves hoa.r.s.e; the men grasping the hands of Volunteers and veterans, and the women, weeping for joy, raising the soldiers' hands to their lips. The glad tidings of victory caused rejoicings everywhere. England, feeling herself free, breathed again. In every church and chapel through the United Kingdom special Services of Thanksgiving for deliverance from the invaders' thrall were held, while in every town popular fetes were organised, and delighted Britons gaily celebrated their magnificent and overwhelming triumph.

In this disastrous struggle between nations France had suffered frightfully. Paris, bombarded and burning, capitulated on the day following the battle of Caterham, and the legions of the Kaiser marched up the Boulevards with their brilliant cavalry uniforms flas.h.i.+ng in the sun. Over the Hotel de Ville, the Government buildings on the Quai d'Orsay, and the Ministries of War and Marine, the German flag was hoisted, and waved lazily in the autumn breeze, while the Emperor William himself had an interview with the French President at the Elysee.

That evening all France knew that Paris had fallen. In a few days England was already s.h.i.+pping back to Dieppe and Riga her prisoners of war, and negotiations for peace had commenced. As security against any further attempts on England, Italian troops were occupying the whole of Southern France from Gren.o.ble to Bordeaux; and the Germans, in addition to occupying Paris, had established their headquarters in Moghilev, and driven back the Army of the Tsar far beyond the Dnieper.

From both France and Russia, Germany demanded huge indemnities, as well as a large tract of territory in Poland, and the whole of the vast Champagne country from Givet, on the Belgian frontier, down to the Saone.

Ten days later France was forced to accept the preliminaries of a treaty which we proposed. This included the cession to us of Algiers, with its docks and harbour, so that we might establish another naval station in the Mediterranean, and the payment of an indemnity of 250,000,000. Our demands upon Russia at the same time were that she should withdraw all her troops from Bokhara, and should cede to us the whole of that portion of the Trans-Caspian territory lying between the mouths of the Oxus and Kizil Arvat, thence along the Persian frontier to Zulfikai, along the Afghan frontier to Karki, and from there up the bank of the Oxus to the Aral Sea. This vast area of land included the cities of Khiva and Merv, the many towns around Kara Khum, the country of the Kara Turkomans, the Tekeh and the Yomuts, and the annexation of it by Britain would effectually prevent the Russians ever advancing upon India.

Upon these huge demands, in addition to the smaller ones by Italy and Austria, a Peace Conference was opened at Brussels without delay, and at length France and her Muscovite ally, both vanquished and ruined, were compelled to accept the proposals of Britain and Germany.

Hence, on November 16th, 1897, the Treaty of Peace was signed, and eight days later was ratified. Then the huge forces of the Kaiser gradually withdrew into Germany, and the soldiers of King Humbert recrossed the Alps, while we s.h.i.+pped back the remainder of our prisoners, reopened our trade routes, and commenced rebuilding our shattered cities.

CHAPTER XLI.

DAWN.

A raw, cold December morning in London. With the exception of a statuesque sentry on the Horse Guards' Parade, the wide open s.p.a.ce was deserted. It had not long been light, and a heavy yellow mist still hung over the gra.s.s in St. James's Park.

A bell clanged mournfully. Big Ben chimed the hour, and then boomed forth eight o'clock. An icy wind swept across the gravelled square. The bare, black branches of the stunted trees creaked and groaned, and the lonely sentry standing at ease before his box rubbed his hands and s.h.i.+vered.

Suddenly a side door opened, and there emerged a small procession.

Slowly there walked in front a clergyman bare-headed, reciting with solemn intonation the Burial Service. Behind him, with unsteady step and bent shoulders, a trembling man with blanched, haggard face, and a wild look of terror in his dark, deep-sunken eyes. He wore a shabby morning-coat tightly b.u.t.toned, and his hands in bracelets of steel were behind his back.

Glancing furtively around at the grey dismal landscape, he shuddered.

Beside and behind him soldiers tramped on in silence.

The officer's sword grated along the gravel.

Suddenly a word of command caused them to halt against a wall, and a sergeant, stepping forward, took a handkerchief and tied it over the eyes of the quivering culprit, who now stood with his back against the wall. Another word from the officer, and the party receded some distance, leaving the man alone. The monotonous nasal utterances of the chaplain still sounded as four privates advanced, and, halting, stood in single rank before the prisoner.

[Ill.u.s.tration: EXECUTION OF VON BEILSTEIN ON THE HORSE GUARDS' PARADE.]

They raised their rifles. There was a momentary pause. In the distance a dog howled dismally.

A sharp word of command broke the quiet.

Then, a second later, as four rifles rang out simultaneously, the condemned man tottered forward and fell heavily on the gravel, shot through the heart.

It was the spy and murderer, Karl von Beilstein!

He had been brought from Glasgow to London in order that certain information might be elicited from him, and after his actions had been thoroughly investigated by a military court, he had been sentenced to death. The whole of his past was revealed by his valet Grevel, and it was proved that, in addition to bringing the great disaster upon England, he had also betrayed the country whose roubles purchased his cunningly-obtained secrets.

Geoffrey Engleheart, although gallantly a.s.sisting in the fight outside Leatherhead, and subsequently showing conspicuous bravery during the Battle of Caterham, fortunately escaped with nothing more severe than a bullet wound in the arm. During the searching private inquiry held at the Foreign Office after peace was restored, he explained the whole of the circ.u.mstances, and was severely reprimanded for his indiscretion; but as no suspicion of von Beilstein's real motive had been aroused prior to the Declaration of War, and as it was proved that Geoffrey was entirely innocent of any complicity in the affair, he was, at the urgent request of Lord Stanbury, allowed to resume his duties. Shortly afterwards he was married to Violet Vayne, and Sir Joseph, having recovered those of his s.h.i.+ps that had been seized by the Russian Government, was thereby enabled to give his daughter a handsome dowry.

The young French clerk who had been engaged at the Admiralty, and who had committed murder for gold, escaped to Spain, and, after being hunted by English and Spanish detectives for many weeks, he became apparently overwhelmed by remorse. Not daring to show himself by day, nor to claim the money that had been promised him, he had tramped on through the snow from village to village in the unfrequented valleys of Lerida, while his description was being circulated throughout the Continent. Cold, weary, and hungry, he one night entered the Posada de las Pijorras at the little town of Oliana, at the foot of the Sierra del Cadi. Calling for wine, he took up a dirty crumpled copy of the Madrid _Globo_, three days old. A paragraph, headed "The Missing Spy," caught his eyes, and, reading eagerly, he found to his dismay that the police were aware that he had been in Huesca a week before, and were now using bloodhounds to track him!

The paper fell from his nerveless grasp. The wine at his elbow he swallowed at one gulp, and, tossing down his last real upon the table, he rose and stumbled away blindly into the darkness.

When the wintry dawn spread in that silent, distant valley, it showed a corpse lying in the snow with face upturned. In the white wrinkled brow was a small dark-blue hole from which blood had oozed over the pallid cheek, leaving an ugly stain. The staring eyes were wide open, with a look of unutterable horror in them, and beside the thin clenched hand lay a revolver, one chamber of which had been discharged!

The dreary gloom of winter pa.s.sed, and there dawned a new era of prosperity for England.

Dark days were succeeded by a period of happiness and rejoicing, and Britannia, grasping her trident again, seated herself on her s.h.i.+eld beside the sea, Ruler of the Waves, Queen of Nations, and Empress of the World.

THE END.