Evno Fisheleovich Azef is perhaps one of the most intriguing and mysterious figures in the history of pre-revolutionary Russia. His activities remain unsolved to this day.

Double agents, to which Evno Azef belonged, caused much concern for their employers, as no one could fully trust them. Azef worked simultaneously for the revolutionaries and the tsarist police.

This unusual man was born in 1869 into the family of a poor tailor in the town of Lyskovo in the Grodno province. After finishing gymnasium, he engaged in small-scale trade of second-hand goods, but in 1892 he was accused of embezzling a client's money. Azef fled to Germany, to the city of Karlsruhe, where he enrolled in a polytechnic school. Lacking funds for his studies, he offered his services to the Russian police department, receiving 50 rubles a month. His reports were so interesting and substantial that they attracted the attention of high-ranking officials. His further work was conducted under the guidance of the head of the Moscow security police, Zubatov.

Upon returning from abroad, Azef infiltrated the Moscow "Union of Socialist-Revolutionaries." He exposed the secret printing house of the organization in Tomsk and several prominent leaders of the Union, all while remaining above suspicion. Soon he headed the Combat Terrorist Organization and managed its funds.

Azef developed a plan to assassinate Minister Plehve, who was causing many problems for the SRs. He informed the head of the security department about the impending assassination, but no one knew that the informant and the terrorist were the same person. During the assassination attempt, Azef was in Warsaw and raised no suspicions.

Azef prepared three more assassination attempts, but only one was successfully completed. The security police began to suspect him of double-dealing, but they had no solid evidence. Azef accused them of killing another double agent, Gapon, who was actually killed on his orders. The last information about the assassination attempt on Nicholas II ultimately saved him. He misinformed the terrorist about the time of the tsar's train passage, and the assassination failed.

Emigrant Vladimir Burtsov began to suspect Azef and conducted his own investigation. Much became clear, and in 1909, a party trial against Azef began in Paris. At the first session, he completely denied his guilt, but fled the city at night. The security police provided him with 2,000 rubles for travel and a passport in the name of Neymeyer. Under this name, he traveled across Europe and played the stock market. In 1915, he was arrested in Germany as a citizen of Russia, with which Germany was at war. He was released only in 1917, but he fell seriously ill in prison and died in a Berlin hospital in 1918. His gravestone bears no name, only a number: "446."

His entire life was a mystery, and all the details of his activities and informants remain unknown to this day. Even his death remains enigmatic, as the significance of these numbers cannot be explained.