High Treason and Low Comedy. Robert T. O’Keeffe
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the tavern, I saw so many white mice ...
CONRAD: So, what’s in there, in the medicine cabinet?
SALVATOR: Champagne is what’s in there, like I just said. I’ve already seen it for myself.
The technical preservation of conversations
UMANITZKY (as he opens the cabinet): Inside there’s a gramophone’s recording device, it’s activated before any important conversation takes place. Here, look, you can see the speaker-horn.
SALVATOR (disappointed): I don’t give a damn about that.
UMANITZKY: Everything that’s said is inscribed by a needle onto a gramophone record, and then it’s stored away and filed by protocol.
SALVATOR: That’s splendid, magnificent! You, Umanitzky, you’ve got to play back everything I’ve just said here, right now. That will be fabulous!
UMANITZKY: I regret to say, Imperial Highness, that the device was not turned on.
SALVATOR: That’s the usual nonsense from you scamps! Naturally — that’s the way it goes, my best speeches and expressions are lost forever. What a pity, that every word a man says is lost. But I’m going to have one of these things made for me at home, then every evening I’ll send off everything I’ve said that day to the Academy of Science, they can play it for their philosophy classes. You do know that I have the title of Protector of the Academy of Science, don’t you, Conrad?
CONRAD: Certainly, your Imperial Highness. Just as your father before you was the Protector of the Academy of Science.
SALVATOR: Aha, I know what you mean to say — you think that I inherited the position, that everything’s due to inheritance, the old protection racket. No, my dear man, it’s not that simple. That having been born an Archduke has offered me some slight advantages, well, I’ll grant you that, but a man must accomplish
All of our arrangements are due to Redl!
something else in this world before he becomes a Protector of the Academy of Sciences!
CONRAD: Certainly, your Imperial Highness! (addressing Umanitzky next): Your arrangements here are cunning, most interesting. Was all this put together according to your instructions?
UMANITZKY: No, your Excellency, the truth of the matter is that all of these arrangements come from Colonel Redl’s work. As the leader of our counterintelligence program Redl organized everything, the criteria for recruiting agents, he wrote the book on methods of surveillance, he established the techniques for exposing foreign spies, all of it.
CONRAD: An ingenious fellow, that Redl. Someday he’s going to be my successor.
SALVATOR: There’s something disgusting about the man, I’ve never seen him with a woman.
UMANITZKY: Too bad he’s not still with us here in intelligence.
CONRAD: Yes, well I definitely had to give him the job of General-Staff Chief in Prague. War could break out at any moment now, and Prague is dangerous terrain, what with all the Panslavism there, constitutionalism, anti-militarism, anti-dynastic sentiments, high treason just beneath the surface — there has to be a man there who knows secret police work thoroughly, someone like Redl.
UMANITZKY: By the way, if I may be permitted to say so, respectfully and without exaggeration, our facilities here are operating just as smoothly under my leadership as if Redl himself were still here.
Conditions along the borders are compromised
CONRAD: Colonel, it’s just on that account that we came here. The intelligence services are not functioning to our satisfaction. What’s the use of all of these criminal investigation facilities when our most secret preparations along the Russian, Serbian and Italian borders can be countered by the enemy within three days?
UMANITZKY: Excellency, we must have a very high-ranking source betraying us.
SALVATOR (making an aside): Oh my soul, maybe I’m about to come under suspicion. (Then speaking aloud): But, my dear gentlemen, I don’t know a thing about our preparations along the borders, I give you my word of honor. The only secrets I could betray are the marching orders against the Ballet or the training regulations over at Frau Sachs’s place.*
CONRAD: Most definitely, we’re being betrayed by a highly placed source. And it’s definitely the job of the intelligence bureau to discover just who this high-ranking source is. Herr Colonel, what steps have you undertaken about that?
SALVATOR: It’s simple. I’d just arrest this highly placed source. And then string him up. It’s all the same to me whether the spy is you or me —— I mean, not me, but you, Umanitzky, for example. Tell me, Conrad, why don’t you just simply have this high-ranker arrested?
CONRAD: Pardon, your Imperial Highness, but we don’t know who he is.
SALVATOR: Well, you’ve got to find that our right away!
CONRAD: Certainly, Imperial Highness. So then, Colonel, what steps have you taken?
* Presumably a “high-class” brothel.
Two packets of money at the post office
UMANITZKY: As your Excellency knows we’ve set up a so-called “black room” at the main post office, where we open suspicious-looking letters and packets — we do it in spite of the legal regulations guaranteeing the inviolability of the mails.
CONRAD: You know, Herr Colonel, you’ve got to take responsibility on my behalf for this, so that not a soul knows anything about it, otherwise we’ll have a fine scandal in the Reichsrat.
UMANITZKY: The police officials who are carrying out the censorship open a thousand letters a day, on the average, and they themselves have not been told that they’re working on behalf of the army. They all believe that the main objective is to uncover toll-tax swindlers and smugglers.
CONRAD: So, what’s the result?
UMANITZKY: Besides the two letters that are being held at the main post office, nothing else special has popped up.
CONRAD: Those are the packets with cash sent from the Russian border, right?
UMANITZKY: Yes, Excellency, the ones from Eydtkühnen.*
CONRAD: And how long have they been lying around there?
UMANITZKY: The first one, containing a payment of eight thousand crowns, arrived back in February, the second one with a payment of six thousand crowns came in during early March.
CONRAD: So, already it’s been almost half a year! Those are very big cash payments – and nobody has picked them up yet!
* A German town on the border with Russia, known as a smuggler’s haven and an active center of Russian espionage activity.
The post office is under surveillance
UMANITZKY: Definitely not yet. Of course we have the postal pick-up counter under surveillance.
SALVATOR: Understood! Outstanding! A doubled guard with bayonets at the ready patrols the postal counter. And when the spy shows up, he’ll be shot right away. An excellent plan, my dear Umanitzky, and I wish you all the luck with it.
CONRAD: How are you carrying out this surveillance, Herr Colonel?
UMANITZKY: I’ve got two plain-clothes detectives from the police housed in a room in the post office, and the room is connected to the pick-up counter by a wire that sends an alarm signal. Whenever somebody shows up to pick up the two letters with the code-name “Operaball 13” on them, the clerk will press a button, and the detectives will rush in.
SALVATOR: ... and seize him, right?
UMANITZKY: To be sure, your Imperial Highness, we’ll seize him.
SALVATOR: Upon my word, that’s just what I thought myself.