Part I—The Whirlpool
PROLOGUE
This is the story of a great peril, and how it was averted.
It is surprising to think how few persons were aware of this peril, or had any suspicion of the extraordinary events that were taking place in Stockholm during the fateful year 1917.
Nevertheless, at the beginning of the year, a little weekly newspaper published a very striking open letter, entitled: "Who is the Man in the Whirlpool?"
To whom was it addressed? There was no indication, but the writer was evidently inspired by a deep and growing conviction of impending evil. The article ran as follows:
Have we lost all power of distinguishing between essentials and non-essentials? Stockholm has become a caravanserai, a link between East and West, a central clearing-house for all those who, under various disguises and with varying aims, seek to enrich themselves in the blood-stained arena of War. Can no one foresee what sort of crop must ultimately spring from this strife-sodden soil? It is tragic, while almost laughable, to see how people persist in labeling as 'espionage' every new development whose purpose is unintelligible to them, in the same way that they would probably account for all unexplained conflagrations with the glib verdict: 'a short-circuit.'
What is espionage? Of course, it exists. But is there nothing more?
Chips from many kinds of timber float on the surface of the whirlpool. What a medley of strange faces, which nobody recognizes, bob up from its mysterious depths!
The short-sighted public are content to go on believing that in Stockholm, where secret committees and conferences, planners and plotters from every quarter of the earth, are struggling together for the mastery, these dark deeds are one and all the work of secret agents of the belligerent powers.
Yet it is as certain as a problem of Euclid that at the vortex of the Whirlpool we shall find a group of intelligences working solely for their own interests. Let us suppose that amongst these, one alone is to be found who is strong enough to fight his way through chaos, or rather let us say, to dominate chaos. Would not such a man establish himself at the very heart of the Whirlpool, to direct the various powers of destruction whither he will?
We need not limit ourselves to supposition: He exists. We do not know who he is, and it is possible that his plans are known to no one besides himself. The air is full of rumors, and no one can tell what the future may bring forth. There is enough to show that a powerful will is evidently directing the activities of many of these lawless phenomena. Who is the Man in the Whirlpool?
Can no one answer the question before it is too late? For he certainly exists.
This appeal fell on deaf ears. The few who read it shook their heads, and laughed. The newspaper relapsed into silence with its next number.
To this very day, nobody knows who wrote the article, though Maurice Wallion can make a pretty shrewd guess. The article does not affect our story except as an example of the characteristic and frequently recurring collapse which precedes the fulfilment of a truth, as the prophetic slump gives warning of a financial crisis. It is known now that there was a Man in the Whirlpool, and in order to give an account of that daring adventurer's gigantic attempt to organize chaos, the author has had recourse to the evidence of a number of persons, in particular Messrs. Wallion and Raebel, and, above all, Mr. Leonard Grath.
But we must tell our tale methodically, and many things happened before the actual appearance of the arch-villain himself. The story opens, appropriately, with the arrival of two of the principal characters in Stockholm, that is to say, on July 19th, 1917. From that moment, the depths begin to seethe, the catastrophe looms nearer, and a Face appears amidst the foaming waters....
The curtain rises....