"God be thanked!" gasped the Empress hysterically. "Then we need no longer fear. Truly Heaven is good to send thee to us, dear Father!" she added, taking his rough hand, with its bulgy knuckles and unclean nails, and kissing it fervently, while all her Court echoed the words so constantly used at the gatherings of the cult: "Holy Father! God be thanked that we are thy chosen sisters." On the following day, however, Rasputin having returned to his house in Petrograd, a secret meeting was held at the house of a man named Roukhloff, situate in the Vereiskaya. The meeting was convened by certain of the monk's enemies in order to expose him as an impostor and a charlatan. It must be remembered that none dreamed that the scoundrel was the direct secret agent of the Kaiser himself, or that Sturmer and Protopopoff were anything else than fine sterling Russian patriots. All three were urging every one to "get on with the war." And with this in mind it induces one to wonder whether a similar farce is not to-day being played in certain political circles in other countries of the Allies! Rasputin had many friends, but he had also made many bitter enemies. As an outcome of that secret meeting, the man Roukhloff, son of a functionary in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, defied the authorities and publicly denounced the "Saint" as "a dangerous erotic humbug." The effect was electrical. The Emperor, with the Empress, Count Fredericks, and Madame Vyrubova, was in the Imperial train, travelling to the Crimea. The moment of that hostile attack was well-chosen, and for a time the "Saint's" position was a precarious one. But as soon as it became known in Petrograd that he had been denounced, his house was crowded by his faithful sister-disciples, who would have no word said against him. He at once announced his intention to return to Siberia, and addressing them with his usual mock piety, said: "The people of Petrograd have cast out the man sent to them by God. I will return to my monastery at Pokrovsky, and pray for their salvation. Assuredly God will punish the disbelievers. You, my sisters, keep faith in your belief. If I never return--then pray for me." An hour afterwards the impostor left for the Nicolas Station, accompanied by a crowd of women-believers of all classes, but instead of travelling to Siberia he changed his route at Moscow and hurried in the track of their Majesties. Meanwhile, the ill-living Archbishop Teofan, who had declared that he "heard in the Holy Father Rasputin the voice of God," and that to hound him from Petrograd meant the incurring of the Divine displeasure and the downfall of the Empire, and Bishop Hermogene, another of the monk's creations who had also belauded him, now both saw an opportunity of denouncing the monk's duplicity and malpractices, and thereby securing the favour of the people for themselves.