Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1930-03-16

When Alice and Charlotte tUere Con.
frOnted Nth each other IN prison, both
told the Germans, II do not knOtU her."
And h0rC SUeU they did kHOtU each
other! But spies neUer recognized
each other. particularly if there sUGs
firing squad scGiting.
= lone hunt that ended In the upper Rhineland.
She found the woman conspirator and by clever
work induced her to return to DuSSeldrf and tell
her story. Had she rested on those laurels her
tale would end here. but she sought fresh
ones After Germany, the great field for secret
service then was Soviet Russia, and there. she
decided she must CO. Old hands tried to dis
Suade her. &
Those Bolshies are a tough gang" they told
her. "If they catch you, it's a bullet, sure.
That's no game for any one like YOU"
ST think L can make it." she said with calm
confidence but bit of pink in her cheeks.
Some say she never had a chance, but that
before even she reached Russia Red agents had
her spotted. Yet some months passed before
they put her in prison. Better for them, per-
haps to have her continue to play her dual
role for her reports to Washington concerned
not the Red army or military matters. but the
political and economic progress OF the Soviet
Republic, and were fair, even favorable, to that
rather friendleSs political experiment. Seeking
truth she exposed propaganda tales, such as
which was merely q Wild proposal once advanced
by an obscure Moscow Anarchist, not Com
.muniSt, newspaper. Also she predicted that the
Soviet government would stand.
But she was long In prison and 1t nearly was
q ballet When American Intelligence heard
of her arrest it got in touch with Tchitcherin
and Krassin, Soviet leaders. ~
"Trotsky wants to shoot her." the Russians
said. "He says he's got the goods on her-even
found codes and secret messages"
ASK TrotSky," said American Intelligence,
eff he has forgotten that the Germans had the
goods ON Edith Cavell and shot her. But what
good did that do the Germans? About the
worst mistake Soviet Russia could make would
be to shoot an American woman Is spy"
So they let her go. and she came home. Fer
adventures had been anodyne to her grief and
even without this one failure, her days IN secret
service would have ended.
"It seems so far away now" she said recently,
smiling. Then, letting fall her sewing and look
ing about the coy living room, And see now
domestic ami I'm sure you won't tell my
name, will you2"
OF course, there is only one answer to that.
OF all woman spies of the World War, the
most poignant resembled In some respects
that American woman; Like her: Louise de
Bettignies was patriot spy, not mercenary:
like her, she was of good, even noble family:
like her she did her secret work without de-
meaning herself, without trading upon her sex.
She won respect of friend and foe. She shone
through the murky secret war, almost Jeanne
1'Arc. Yet ss last being not divine but human,
and a woman gently reared, sensitive, she failed
and died in prison.
But her soul marched on. After the victory
she had helped to win, French and British gave
her great military funerals. They laid treas
ured decorations upon the caSket, citations for
displaying, in word. heroism which, has
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