The Minister of Evil

The Minister of Evil, by William Le Queux

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Title: The Minister of Evil The Secret History of Rasputin's Betrayal of Russia
Author: William Le Queux
Release Date: September 22, 2007 [EBook #22720]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
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The Minister of Evil
The Secret History of RASPUTIN'S Betrayal of Russia
William Le Queux
Cassell and Company, Ltd London, New York, Toronto and Melbourne
First Published August 1918. Reprinted September 1918.
Copyright, 1917, by William Le Queux, in the United States of America.

TO THE READER
AFTER the issue to the public of the curious chronicle of "Rasputin the Rascal Monk," based upon official documents, and its translation into a number of languages, I received from the same sources in Russia a bulky manuscript upon very thin paper which contained certain confessions, revelations, and allegations made by its writer, F��odor Rajevski, who acted as the mock-saint's secretary and body-servant, and who, in consequence, was for some years in a position to know the most inner secrets of Rasputin's dealings with those scoundrelly men and women who betrayed Holy Russia into the hands of the Hun.
This manuscript, to-day before me as I write, is mostly in Italian, for Rajevski, the son of a Polish violinist, lived many years of his youth in Bologna, Florence, and old-world Siena, hence, in writing his memoirs, he used the language most familiar to him, and one perhaps more readily translated by anyone living outside Russia.
In certain passages I have been compelled to disguise names of those who, first becoming tools of the mock-saint, yet afterwards discovering him to be a charlatan, arose in their patriotism and--like Rajevski who here confesses--watched patiently, and as Revolutionists became instrumental in the amazing charlatan's downfall and his ignominious death.
These startling revelations of the secretary to the head of the "dark forces" in Russia, as they were known in the Duma, are certainly most amazing and unusually startling, forming as they do a disgraceful secret page of history that will prove of outstanding interest to those who come after us.
I confess that when first I read through the bald statements of fact, which I have here endeavoured to place in readable form for British readers, I became absorbed--therefore I venture to believe that they will be just as interesting to others who read them.
WILLIAM LE QUEUX.
DEVONSHIRE CLUB, LONDON, January, 1918.

CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
1. RASPUTIN MEETS THE EMPRESS 1 2. RASPUTIN ENTERS TSARSKOE-SELO 19 3. THE POTSDAM PLOT DEVELOPS 36 4. THE MURDER OF STOLYPIN 53 5. THE POWER BEHIND THE THRONE 68 6. RASPUTIN IN BERLIN 85 7. SCANDAL AND BLACKMAIL 100 8. RASPUTIN THE ACTUAL TSAR 116 9. THE TRAGEDY OF MADAME SVETCHINE 132 10. TRAITOROUS WORK 148 11. POISON PLOTS THAT FAILED 163 12. RASPUTIN AND THE KAISER 180 13. THE "PERFUME OF DEATH" 197 14. MILIUKOFF'S EXPOSURE 214 15. THE TRAITORS DENOUNCED 229
CHAPTER I
RASPUTIN MEETS THE EMPRESS
THE Spanish author Yriarte wrote those very true words:
"Y ahora digo yo; llene un volumen De disparates un Autor famoso, Y si no alabaren, que me emplumen."
For those who do not read Spanish I would translate the passage as:
"Now I say to you; let an author of renown fill a book with twaddle, and if it is not praised by the critics, you may tar and feather me."
I am not an author of renown. Indeed, I make no pretence of the delicacies of literary style, or the turning of fine phrases of elegant diplomacy. My object is merely to record in these pages the truth regarding the crumbling of Russia, and the downfall of our Imperial Throne.
Anyone who cares to search the voluminous records in the Bureau of Police in the long Bibikovsky Boulevard, in Kiev, will find my dossier neatly filed and tabulated, as are those of most Russians. You will find that I, F��odor, son of F��odor Rajevski, musician temporarily abroad, and his wife Varvara, was born in the Via Galliera, at Bologna, in Italy, on July 8, 1880, and on March 3, 1897, entered the University in the Vladimirskaya. I venture to think that the police have but little inscribed to my detriment save perhaps a few students' pranks in the Kreshtchatik, and the record of that memorable night when we daubed with blue and white paint the equestrian statue in front of the Merchants' Club, and I was fined twenty roubles by the bearded old magistrate for the part I played in the joke.
Had there been anything serious