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Mata Hari was convicted of espionage against France and placed on death row in the notorious Paris prison of Saint-Lazare. This chapter describes how she ended up in a rat-infested prison when exotic dancing, divorce, and relentless ambition were her only crimes.

This chapter focuses on Margaretha Geertruida Zelle's new life in Paris after leaving her husband. Margaretha became a part of the demimonde—the working women, the theatrical women, singers, actresses, dancers, and prostitutes who traded in their “decency” for freedom over their own lives. She took the name Mata Hari and gave Paris its first genuinely fake Oriental temple dancer.

This chapter considers the implications of Mata Hari's life and death. It suggests that her posthumous life as the ultimate femme fatale spy has not only been more glamorous than her real life ever was but far more useful to the public's imagination. While innocent of espionage, Mata Hari was guilty of the self-importance that had initially made her a noticed woman—and a condemned one.

This chapter presents the story of Mata Hari, the most famous female spy of the twentieth century, who was condemned to a death by firing squad. Her story, like so many women's and like Salome's, traces the tragedy of surrendering to one beautiful young man.

This chapter describes the life of Margaretha Geertruida Zelle, a.k.a Mata Hari. It covers her abusive marriage to Rudolph Macleod; the fatal poisoning of her son Norman John by his nurse in 1899; and her destitution after separating from her husband in 1900.

This introductory chapter first describes the author's inspiration for writing this book, namely the image of French novelist Sidonie Gabrielle Colette's left breast, which symbolized something that the author wanted for herself, though she was not sure exactly what that was. Her search was furthered by a second vision that came a few years later, after watching a strip show at the Crazy Horse Saloon in Paris. The discussion then turns to the four heroines of this book: Maud Allan, the Canadian modern dancer; Mata Hari, the Dutch spy; Ida Rubinstein, the Russian performance artist; and Colette.

Asian Americans joined X-2 (the counterintelligence branch) and were involved in spy hunts. They were not always successful, as the Japanese Mata Hari’s spy ring eluded capture. Yet Asian American like John Kwock were nevertheless effective in securing OSS facilities from penetration by Japanese and Chinese Nationalist agents under Tai Li. Their greatest contribution, however, came with the Allied POWs rescue operations for missions code-named Cardinal and Pigeon. They also took up war crimes investigations immediately after the cessation of hostilities. They looked into alleged collaborationist activities of their ethnic cohorts such as Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan’s radio propaganda broadcaster Herbert Moy, and others whose alleged activities were deemed treasonous by European American investigators such as Frank Farrell. With their expert knowledge of the local context in East Asia as well as the alleged traitors’ Asian American background, this provided them with a unique ability to assess these cases.