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I returned to London and read shortly afterwards in The Times that Macedonian troubles had settled down and recollecting that at Ipek I had learnt they had not yet begun I wrote and told The Times so. But it was far too well informed to print this statement. Had it not withdrawn its correspondent? And, as Rizoff had told me, a general Bulgar rising broke out all through Macedonia in August.
"Poor Queen, poor Queen!" she muttered at intervals, "she was still alive when they threw her from the window. If I had been there I would have wept on her grave." She was but fifteen, and it was her initiation into those Balkan politics in which, as Madame Rizoff, she was herself later to play a part. We shouted our last "Zhivio!" The play was over.
Through Rizoff I was told Montenegro hoped to attain to much. I had been so disgusted over the bomb affair in 1908 that I had fully intended not to visit Montenegro again. I was sick of the web of intrigue which entangled the land. But now it seemed that only from Montenegro could I watch the case for Albania.
I Was in Egypt when a Reuter telegram announced that the Austrians had taken the Lovtchen, occupied Cetinje, and appointed as Mayor "the Bulgarian Vuletitch." I guessed at once this was my old friend Vulco of the Grand Hotel. His son-in-law, Rizoff, who had had to leave Rome, where he was working a pro-German propaganda, was now Bulgarian Minister at Berlin.
I fear it is not so joyful as they anticipated. Vuko Vukotitch was as sore as Sofia Petrovna. He, too, had been accused of anti-Petrovitch sympathies, and threatened with the boycott of his hotel. He was seeking influential marriages for his many daughters. The eldest, Madame Rizoff, as wife of the Bulgarian diplomatic agent, was already playing a part in politics.
I had hoped that it would have been used for irrigating, or otherwise developing the land, and promptly sold out my few shares in disgust and at par. I wonder how many other people got out as cheaply? Vuko Vuletitich was swollen with pride over his daughter, who, as Madame Rizoff, held a great position as wife of the Bulgarian Minister in Rome and was known as "la bella Montenegrina."
I received a note next morning from the Bulgarian diplomatic agent praying for an interview. He had not been long in Cetinje, but later became one of the best known Balkan politicians. For he was Monsieur Rizoff, who, as Bulgar Minister at Berlin, played a considerable part in the Balkan politics of the great war.
And he told me quite frankly that all was being prepared and a rising was to break out in Macedonia so soon as the crops were harvested. I gathered that Rizoff himself was deeply mixed in the plot, an idea which was confirmed later on.
For among the papers captured on a Bulgar comitadgi, Doreff, was a letter signed Grasdoff, describing his attempts to import arms through Montenegro, a plan he found impossible owing to the opposition of the Albanians in the territories that must be passed through. He visited Cetinje and reports: "I have spoken with M. Rizoff.
This was signed a little later by Prince Bülow and M. Rizoff at Rome. There were more reasons than one for keeping this secret.
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